<< | overview | >>

EUROSION: Case Study: Dolos-Kiti (Cyprus)

Type of Entry: Case Study
Description:

Dolos-Kiti coastal area is located in Larnaka District, at the south coast of Cyprus. The total length of the coastline is 36km. There are 10 villages in the coastal area, with a total population of 9,173 and several conflicting uses like industry, tourism, agriculture and aquaculture. The coast is generally relatively low and flat, and it is mainly characterised by accumulations of gravel and pebble and few tiny poor sandy beaches. The coastlines of Cyprus are under increasing pressure of economic development, particularly tourism development.

The economy of Cyprus depends considerably on the tourist industry, the farewell of which depends largely on the quality of the beaches. The 30% of the total coastline of the island suffer from erosion (in some areas reaches about 0.5m/yr). Erosion of the coastline due to natural but mainly to manmade causes, coupled with shortage of fine sandy beaches became a serious problem of growing concern the last 20 years. At the same time the growing pressure for utilisation and exploitation of the coastal zone was making the whole picture worse.

Since late 1980s, Cyprus Government has realised that coastal zone is a natural resource for the island which was under the threat of extinction due to the over pressure resulting from intensive tourist development. The problem of erosion still exists in several coastlines of the island, although there have been efforts to implement Integrated Coastal Zone Management. The land uses of the coastal area have been mainly agricultural until recently, when by a reform of the Town Planning regime most of the agricultural areas have been characterised as tourist or development areas. This led to a sudden increase of pressure for tourism and real estate development. Eventually the problem of beach quality became very important and efforts started to combat erosion, some using legal and some illegal methods.

Keywords: Beach protection, Coastal erosion, Tools and techniques for beach management
Documents:
EUROSION Case Study: Dolos-Kiti (Cyprus) (223.733 Bytes)
 
Contact: Xenia I.LOIZIDOU
TRITON Consultants (Cyprus) Ltd.
Telephone: +35 722 452 727/ +35 722 458 486