MEDITERRANEAN ACTION PLAN

Rapport de l’Atelier sur le tourisme et le développement durable en Méditerranée
Antaly (Turquie), 17, 18 & 19 septembre 1998
3.4 Conflicts between Tourism and the Environment In the
Mediterranean (Professor Michael Scoullos, Chairman, Mediterranean
Information Office for Environment, Culture and Sustainable Development
- MIO-ECSDE)
My intervention refers exclusively to the Conflicts, between tourism end the
environment, therefore, basically to the negative impact of tourism on the
environment.
Initially, at the beginning of the development in an area, this is a one-way
aggression, a one-way reaction: The pressures exerted by tourism on the natural
and cultural environment of the Mediterranean heritage and socio-economic
structures of a region which is the destination.
It is meaningless to talk about the negative impact of the environment on tourism,
at least in a new well-managed tourist destination. Later on, however, in relatively
old and over-exploited destinations we may see, eventually, the reverse reaction or,
If you wish, the « revenge reaction » when polluted, noisy and dusty historic towns,
contaminated and dirty waters and coasts, seriously damaged biotopes and
landscapes and « crumbling » relics of monuments, villages without special
« colour » and identity, without character, without local food and frequently
without local people may have, indeed, a very negative impact on tourism.
The above may be considered already the summary of my contribution. All the rest
is a further sporadic analysis of the negative impacts of tourism, if its development
is not well planned, controlled and integrated into a wider development policy, in
other words if it is not sustainable.
I would also like to emphasise that MlO-ECSDE and myself as a person believe
that tourism is, to a certain extend, one of the activities reasonably adaptable, to
sustainability criteria. This is due to the fact that sooner or later all stakeholders
dealing with this business if they are serious, medium and long term oriented and
particularly if and when the basis of their interests is, to a large extend, localregional
or national, understand that their « capital » is not only their investment
and infrastructures but mainly the natural and cultural environment per se, which
cannot be consumed at ratios greater then its « renewal capacity » . In this respect
we could not only refer to the extremely difficult to quantify "carrying capacities" of
the tourist destination and their surrounding hinterlands, but also about the
necessary « regeneration, restoration or renewal periods » . This is a point and
concept very little studied. At least in some cases MlO-ECSDE does not favour
uncritically what seems to be one of the most common recommendations for
sustainable tourism, namely the expansion of the tourist period, if possibly, evenly
throughout the year. Let me explain in more detail why:
The « low season » is an interval where both nature and local society recover. Even
local and regional production, but also administrative and institutional
mechanisms « recharge » their batteries and restore, reorganise and renovate.
There is a return to normal life levels (normal for the size and character of the
communities they serve).
In Rhodes, where MIO-ECSDE conducts a study and has an important project
called SUDECIR supported by DG.XIl, I was told by the political authorities that
during the « high » tourist season it is very difficult to run properly even the works
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