Greece - Korina Miller [59]
Most of the parks are surrounded by buffer zones protecting an inner wilderness area. Some activities, such as grazing, woodcutting, camping and fish farms, are permitted in the buffer areas, but no activities other than walking are allowed in the protected area. For a rundown of Greece’s parks, boxed text.
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ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES
Greece is belatedly becoming environmentally conscious. Global awareness, a greater sensitivity on the part of younger generations, and sheer financial inducements from funding bodies are shifting Greece’s devil-may-care attitude of yesteryear to a growing awareness that the environmental rape and pillage of a land cannot go on forever.
General environmental awareness remains at a low level, especially where litter is concerned. The problem is particularly bad in rural areas, where roadsides are strewn with soft-drink cans and plastic packaging hurled from passing cars. Environmental education has begun in schools and recycling is more commonly seen in city centres, but it will be a long time before community attitudes change.
Long-standing problems such as deforestation and soil erosion date back thousands of years. Live cultivation and goats have been the main culprits, while firewood gathering, shipbuilding, housing and industry have all taken their toll.
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www.cleanupgreece.org.gr promotes programs and events aimed at building awareness of the protection of Greece’s environment.
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Forest fires are a major problem, with many thousands of hectares destroyed annually, often in some of the most picturesque areas of Greece. The increasing scale of recent fires is blamed on rising Mediterranean temperatures and high winds. Massive fires on Mt Parnitha and in the Peloponnese in the summer of 2007 destroyed large tracts of that area’s vegetation, as well as entire villages, and changed the face of the landscape for hundreds of years to come.
The result is that the forests of ancient Greece have all but disappeared. Epiros and Macedonia in northern Greece are now the only places where extensive tracts remain. This loss of forest cover has been accompanied by serious soil erosion. Many locals argue that the government continues to be ill-prepared to deal with the annual fires and that its attempts to address the problem are slow, with long overdue reforestation programs that it is felt are not enough.
Illegal development of mainly coastal areas and building in forested or protected areas has gained momentum in Greece since the 1970s. Despite attempts at introducing laws to stop the land-grab and protests by locals and environmental groups, corruption and the lack of an infrastructure to enforce the laws means little is done to abate the problem. The issue is complicated by population growth and increased urban sprawl, as upwardly mobile residents from inner Athens head to the outskirts. The developments often put a severe strain on the environment, including water supplies and endangered wildlife. A few spectacularly outrageous, purely-for-profit developments have been torn down in recent years, however in more cases, the illegal buildings have been legalised. Often this is deemed necessary due to social need, whereby demolition would leave residents with no alternative affordable housing.
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The current advance of global warming means that 0.4% of Greece’s land mass is predicted to be submerged by water before the end of the century.
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Global warming is playing havoc with the Greek thermometer and it’s believed that by the end of the century, the average temperature in Athens will rise by 8°C, while some 560 sq km of coastal land will be flooded. Areas at greatest risk include