Warm waters draw sharks off Israel's Mediterranean coast

France24 – AFP, 20 April 2021 

This picture taken on April 20, 2021 shows an aerial view of people using their
phones and cameras to film a shark swimming past in the shallow Mediterranean
Sea water off the Israeli coastal town of Hadera north of Tel Aviv JACK GUEZ AFP

Hadera (Israel) (AFP) -  Dozens of sharks gathered Tuesday in warm waters of the Mediterranean near an Israeli power plant, drawing sightseers in what has become an annual occurence. 

The sharks' fins sliced through the swallow waters just metres (yards) away from bathers eager to take photos of them near the city of Hadera. 

Sandbar and dusky sharks, which are known to frequent the waters, can grow up to three metres (10 feet) in length. 

The sharks gather each year near where the power plant's hot water outlet gushes into the Mediterranean Sea. 

The Israel Nature and Parks Authority warned both amateur and professional divers against swimming with the creatures. 

"The interaction with sharks is neither predictable or controllable, and in recent days there has also been a change in the sharks' behaviour," the authority wrote. 

The sharks are endangered and it is illegal to harm, feed or harass them, the authority added. 

Most of those in the waters off Hadera on Tuesday were dusky sharks, though some were the slightly smaller sandbar sharks, said Aviad Scheinin, an expert on apex predators at the University of Haifa. 

In the Mediterranean, the sandbars are endangered and there is not enough data on the dusky sharks to determine their status, he told AFP. 

The mostly female dusky sharks come in late November and leave in early May, Scheinin said. 

"We think it might be something to do with the reproductive cycle," he said. 

The mostly male sandbar sharks arrive in January, although this season researchers found one female among some 20 males, he said. 

"We're not sure why they are coming. It's an open question," he said of the sandbar sharks.

Aquaculture offers lifeline to floundering Moroccan fishermen

Yahoo – AFP, Hicham Rafih with Sophie Pons in Rabat, October 31, 2019

Aquaculture offers hope to struggling fishermen in the Moroccan city of M'diq
(AFP Photo/FADEL SENNA)

Saïdia (Morocco) (AFP) - With fish stocks declining in the Mediterranean, struggling Moroccan fishermen are hoping to turn to aquaculture as a way to secure their future.

"We don't get anything from the sea anymore, we're paying for the mistakes of our fathers," said Mohamed Bouajra, a fisherman in Ras Kebdana, a port town near Morocco's eastern border with Algeria.

But aquaculture offers a "glimmer of hope for escaping poverty", he said.

In Ras Kebdana, the Al Amal cooperative for independent fishermen is banking on the development of an offshore mussel farm to maintain future livelihoods.

Another cooperative at Mar Chica lagoon, some 40 kilometres (24 miles) west, runs a red algae farm to supply pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries.

Aimed at preserving fish stocks and supplementing falling revenues for small-scale fishermen, these two pilot projects are part of an ambitious national plan launched in 2009 called Blue Morocco.

While the number of fishing boats in Ras Kebdana has tripled since the 1990s, "there are no more fish", said Bouajra.

Now in his 60s, Bouajra recalls the good days when fishing from his wooden boat would bring in 400 dirhams a day ($41).

Today, he said he is lucky to make 40 dirhams: "You can't live on that."

Fishermen say they are paying for the "mistakes of our fathers", with no 

fish stock left in the sea (AFP Photo/FADEL SENNA)

Figures from Morocco's department of maritime fishing confirm the decline. Catches in the eastern Oriental region dropped from 14.7 tonnes to 7.4 between 2013 and 2017.

Along the rest of Morocco's Mediterranean coast, catches declined 30 percent, alarming authorities.

Depleted fisheries are a financial concern, as exported seafood brought 22 billion dirhams in 2017 ($2.2 billion), about half of food exports and 10 percent of total exports.

Seaweed, algae

"With climate change, the environment is deteriorating and fish are becoming scarce -- not only in Morocco but across the world. We need to find alternatives to survive," said Mimoune Bouasu.

The 47-year-old fisherman heads the independent fishermen's cooperative in Mar Chicha, which manages 11 hectares (27 acres) of red algae aquafarms.

The cooperative sells the seaweed for six dirhams a kilo to a Moroccan company that invested in the venture.

"What we lack from fishing, we get from the algae," said Bouasu, adding that he hopes the project will increase in size.

The cooperative currently employs eight people and recruits seasonal labour during planting and harvesting.

Further west along the Mediterranean near the Strait of Gibraltar, Abdelaziz Benhamou is in charge of production at an aquafarm in M'diq.

A diver gathers mussels in a farm off the coast of the port city of Nador in 

Morocco (AFP Photo/FADEL SENNA)

The Aqua M'diq company employs 24 staff and raises sea bass in offshore cages.

It is considered a model fish farm by the National Aquaculture Development Agency (ANDA), which hopes to replicate the project elsewhere on the Mediterranean or Atlantic coasts.

"Resources diminished because fishermen didn't respect closed seasons for most species. Today, that's starting to change, but everyone agrees that nothing is like before," the 50-year-old former fisherman said.

In a recent report, Morocco's financial oversight body, the court of auditors, warned of "over-exploited stocks", blaming non-compliance with regulations governing quotas, restrictions on fishing gear and closed seasons.

Changing mindsets

The court also highlighted delays in developing the aquaculture sector, noting that "certain strategic objectives have not been met".

The 2009 Blue Morocco plan envisaged producing 200,000 tonnes of seafood from aquaculture by 2020. But in 2018, production was only 700 tonnes, according to ANDA.

After several years of technical studies, some 150 projects are now "in the process of launching" with private investment, according to Mustafa Amzough.

A manager at ANDA, Amzough says these projects -- including 15 in the Mediterranean -- have a total objective of 150,000 tonnes.

Fishermen work on a fish farm off the Moroccan city of M'diq on the 

Mediterranean (AFP Photo/FADEL SENNA)

In Ras Kebdana, undersea nets for growing mussels have only been installed across five of the site's 15 hectares. And the shellfish are still not ready for harvest, five years after the project was launched.

The 35 members of the cooperative maintain the mussels, hoping to begin sales next year.

In the meantime, boats continue going out for octopus, the main seafood available in the area.

But despite this, fisherman Bouajra says the mussel farm has already changed people's mindset. "Before, there was no respect for the environment."

Now there is weekly water sampling and analysis to monitor the health of the water.

"Today, the water is clean," he said.

With fish stocks declining in the Mediterranean, struggling Moroccan fishermen are hoping aquaculture will help secure their futurehttps://t.co/Q8KTtKgFwD pic.twitter.com/v3s7zzlAVW

— AFP news agency (@AFP) 31 oktober 2019

France reverses car tyre sea sanctuary -- an environmental flop

Yahoo – AFP, Vincent-Xavier MORVAN, September 23, 2018

Ten thousand tyres are set to be lifted out of the sea by the divers and boat crew
over the next few weeks, with the remaining 12,500 extracted in the second
quarter of 2019 (AFP Photo/VALERY HACHE)

Vallauris (France) (AFP) - What seemed a like a crazy idea turned out to be just that: a 1980s experiment that saw 25,000 car tyres dumped into the crystal-clear waters of the Mediterranean to create a sanctuary for sealife off the French coast is being cleaned up after it was found to be polluting.

Since the start of last week, divers and a specially equipped boat with lifting gear have been fishing out hundreds of the old loops of rubber about 500 metres (1,600 feet) from an exclusive coastline between the towns of Cannes and Antibes.

The original vision, backed by local French authorities at the time and fishermen, was that the tyres would become populated by coral and other sea creatures in a conservation area where fishing was off limits.

In France, the idea of a "tyre reef" was tried only here, but a local academic working on the clean-up operation said authorities in other countries, particularly the United States, had tried the same failed idea.

"We hoped (back in the 1980s) that we could restore aquatic life there, but it didn't work," the deputy mayor of Antibes, Eric Duplay told AFP. "It turns out that the tyre reef was not a prolific place for biomass."

Denis Genovese, the head of an association of local fishermen, confirmed that most Mediterranean lifeforms had shunned the idea of living inside mad-made products manufactured out of rubber, resins, oil and other chemicals.

Divers and a specially equipped boat with lifting gear have been fishing out hundreds

 of the old rubber tyres 500 metres (1,600 feet) from an exclusive coastline between

the French resorts of Cannes and Antibes (AFP Photo/VALERY HACHE)

Leaking toxic chemicals

Sedentary creatures such as the local scorpion fish didn't use them, Genovese said, while "grouper fish, conger eels and sea bream swim around them, but no species really got used to it".

Worse, a study in 2005 by researchers at the University of Nice showed that the tyres were leaking toxic chemicals into the environment, including heavy metals, which are a threat to human life.

Authorities were also worried that the tyres could degrade further, nearly 40 years after they sank to the seabed, and break up into smaller pieces which would be a risk for nearby seagrass meadows.

In 2015, a first mission to remove 2,500 tyres was undertaken to show that they could be extracted safely, with the work underway at the moment a second and more important phase of the clean-up operation.

Around 10,000 are set to be lifted by the divers and boat crew over the next few weeks, with the remaining 12,500 extracted in the second quarter of 2019.

Regeneration hopes

AFP hopped aboard the vessel last week to watch the progress in action as dozens of a tyres were hauled from the sea, with the luxury holiday villas of the French Riviera visible on the coastline behind.

Local French authorities and fishermen hoped back in the 1980s that the tyres 

would become populated by coral and other sea creatures in a conservation area 

where fishing was off limits (AFP Photo/VALERY HACHE)

The Saudi royal family own a huge villa on a small stretch of beach opposite the site, which was the focus of a scandal in 2015 when King Salman tried to privatise the sand for his holiday and caused an uproar among locals.

The fine white sand is a problem for the clean-up team of divers, which struggle with low visibility as they find the tyres and thread them on to wire cables which are then lifted to the surface.

"In the morning, it's easy, the water's clear," crew member Morgan Postic on board the Ocea vessel said. "But as we stir it all up down at the bottom, you can't see anything and it gets much more complicated."

The tyres will be sent to the nearby city of Nice and then to recycling centres where they will be broken up into granules that can be used in construction projects.

"After that we'll leave the seabed to restore itself naturally and we'll continue to monitor with censors," said marine scientist Patrice Francour from the University of Nice, who is working on the issue.

Francour said the clean-up would end France's one and only experiment with a "tyre reef", but that other countries still had to deal with the legacy of the failed idea, notably the United States.

A million euros has been provided by the French state to finance the French clean-up, while French tyre company Michelin has contributed 200,000 euros (235,000 dollars).

Migrant rescuers, island mayor win UNESCO peace prize

Yahoo – AFP, Ella IDE, April 19, 2017

Migrants are rescued off the coast of Libya by SOS Mediterranee's Aquarius
vessel in May 2016 (AFP Photo/GABRIEL BOUYS)

Rome (AFP) - UNESCO awarded its prestigious peace prize on Wednesday to migrant rescue association SOS Mediterranee and the mayor of Lampedusa, the tiny Italian island on the frontline of the refugee crisis.

The Felix Houphouet-Boigny Peace Prize goes to the European NGO and mayor Giuseppina Nicolini "for their work to save the lives of refugees and migrants and welcome them with dignity," the UN cultural body said in a statement.

The plight of migrants constitutes "one of the crucial issues of our day, notably in the Mediterranean where nearly 13,000 men, women and children have perished in shipwrecks since 2013," said acting jury head Joaquim Chissano, former president of Mozambique.

Lampedusa, Italy's most southerly outpost, was the first port of arrival for thousands of migrants setting off from North Africa in the first years of the crisis, which began in 2011 and has developed into the worst since World War II.

SOS Mediterranee, founded in 2015, rescues hundreds of men, women and children each week from flimsy dinghies and boats in the Mediterranean, along with other NGOs.

Nicolini was recognised for "her boundless humanity and unwavering commitment to refugee crisis management and integration in response to the arrival of thousands of refugees on the shores of Lampedusa and elsewhere in Italy".

The mayor of Lampedusa, Giuseppina Nicolini, has been recognised for her

work at the frontline of the refugee crisis (AFP Photo/ANDREAS SOLARO)

'Watery grave'

"I dedicate this prize to all those who did not make it across the sea because they were swallowed up, and also to Gabriele Del Grande," said Nicolini, referring to an Italian journalist arrested in Turkey this month while researching the lives of Syrian refugees.

"He was the first to count the Mediterranean's dead on a website, back when nobody even knew people were dying in the Mediterranean. He is now a prisoner in Turkey," she said, calling on the government to "bring him home".

The jury said SOS Mediterranee's Aquarius vessel, co-run by Doctors Without Borders, had saved more than 11,000 lives since it began search and rescue missions off Lampedusa in early 2016.

"We're so happy to be given this award together with Nicolini. We visited her when we were starting up and she said 'you are crazy but I am with you, because this is what we need after the failures of the EU'," said Sophie Beau, SOS Mediterranee co-founder.

The jury appealed to the international community "to ensure that the Mediterranean sea becomes, once again, a place where solidarity and intercultural dialogue hold sway, and that it ceases to serve as a watery grave".

Private rescue vessels sounded the alarm this weekend over the "unprecedented mass rescues" of people fleeing horrors in conflict-torn Libya, recovering seven bodies including that of an eight-year-old, and warning more migrants risked drowning without EU action.

Close to 37,000 people have been brought to safety in Italy so far this year, a 45 percent increase on the same period in 2016.

Migrants waiting to disembark from the Aquarius which has saved more than

11,000 lives since early 2016, the jury said (AFP Photo/Giovanni ISOLINO)

Solidarity

The EU's border control agency Frontex has accused donor-funded vessels of doing more harm than good by acting "like taxis" off Libya and tempting human traffickers to put as many people as possible out to sea in flimsy vessels.

Italian prosecutors have suggested they may have links with traffickers and in March named SOS Mediterranee's activity as being of interest to investigators, along with other private rescue vessels.

Their charges have been fiercely rejected by the NGOs, with SOS Mediterranee saying Wednesday it had "never, not once" been put in contact with migrants via smugglers.

"European governments need to show more solidarity to the humanitarian organisations that are working on the front line of this humanitarian crisis. Border control is not the solution," said Regina Catrambone, the director of MOAS rescue service.

UNESCO's Felix Houphouet-Boigny Peace Prize, created in 1989 to honour those making a significant contribution to peace, has gone in the past to Nelson Mandela, Israel's Shimon Peres and the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, King Juan Carlos of Spain and former US president Jimmy Carter.

Hoping for a fresh sea breeze aboard a cruise ship? Better hold your nose!

French TV journalists have secretly measured the air quality on a cruise ship. The results are devastating: The air is significantly worse polluted than it would be in thick urban traffic.

Deutsche Welle, 26 January 2017

Cruises are increasingly popular among today's tourists. They offer relaxation with 24-hour service for stressed out office workers.

Forget about searching for the perfect, pristine beach - which most people will never find, anyhow. Instead, just go to the pool on the upper deck, enjoy some tasty drinks and take in breathtaking views of the ocean from high above. For people who need less contemplation, cruises offer theater and show performances, generous meals, bars and shopping opportunities.

That doesn't mean you're in for a boring vacation: Adventure comes as part of the risk free deal. Even frail seniors can now feel like mystic characters such as Long John Silver from Treasure Island or real explorers like Roald Amundsen - be it by cruising the romantic Carribean, visiting savage South Sea islands or admiring polar bears on impenetrable arctic shores. Finally you can do something for your health by going to the ship's gym and getting a good work out.

Tourists want to enjoy themselves - and the fresh sea breeze.

But you better think twice about taking a deep breath. The German Environmental Association "Naturschutzbund Deutschland"(NABU) now warns that it is more likely you inhale polluted air than a fresh breeze. NABU says that it cannot recommend any of the large European cruise ships.

"Pamphlets lead you to believe that there are blue skies and white ships - a dream-like setting," Daniel Rieger, who is in charge of transportation policies at NABU, said. "The truth is that clouds of black soot are emitted from the funnels."

Measuring results are worse than expected

Recent measurements of actual air quality onboard a cruise ship seem to support NABU's view. French TV journalists from broadcaster France 3 conducted covert measurements while on a cruise. They boarded a ship in Marseille for a cruise of the Mediterranean.

Results show that "the shipping companies are exposing their travelers to high concentrations of harmful substances," NABU managing director Leif Miller concluded.

Even environmentalists were surprised by the high concentrations that the journalists detected. Right after leaving Marseille, air pollution was roughly 200 times that of a heavily trafficked urban street.

Besides fine dust and soot, the combustion of marine diesel fuel and heavy oil also set free other harmful substances such as nitrogen oxides and heavy metals.

Former captain and ship broker Helge Grammerstorf, who is the German national director of the Cruise Lines International Association CLIA, defends his industry. He told the daily "Hamburger Abendblatt:" "We don't know these measurements. The claim is completely unsubstantiated."

Grammerstorf argues that the measurements were taken only selectively and that one would need to run a more systematic test to collect data over a longer time period.

Hardly noticeable for passengers

"The passengers can only smell or see the particles before they get mixed up with the ambient air," NABU spokesman Rieger said after the France 3 test results were published.

He argued that it wouldn't take the shipping companies much to change the pollution and to increase comfort. "Even switching from marine diesel fuel or heavy oil to regular road diesel fuel would make a big difference," he said.

In addition, it wouldn't be too hard to install effective exhaust cleaning systems, according to NABU. Such systems have long existed with established standards for trucks and trains.

"The question is whether the industry deliberately looks the other way," Dietmar Oellinger - NABU's transport expert - said.

He suggested that the tests taken by the French journalists were merely an example and could possibly be representative for the entire cruise ship industry.

"The reality is black soot from the chimneys," NABU environmentalists say.

"We should ask how much more proof the industry needs before they finally take action," Oellinger said.

Some cruise lines have pledged to install particle filters, but so far, there are none in use.

Covert measuring only in the harbor

Previously, NABU has only had the opportunity to measure harmful ultra fine dust particles in the air around cruise ships in harbors. They have done so in Hamburg, Venice and the north-eastern German city of Rostock-Warnemünde. The ship owners did not allow the environment agency to take measurements on board, Daniel Rieger said.

The results were devastating nonetheless: In all cases the ships were burning off heavy oil. Four of five ships were not equipped with any exhaust gas cleaning or they were only fulfilling the lowest legal standard for northern Europe - a system that only reduces sulfur oxide emissions.

Technical solutions to reduce particle and nitrogen oxide emissions have long been on the market, though. Therefore, NABU argues, not implementing them is largely due to greed. It would cost money to install the system and furthermore require the companies to use more expensive types of fuel.

Almost as dangerous as asbestos

The German Lung Foundation already recommended several years ago that people with chronic respiratory diseases only stay on certain parts of the deck when on a cruise ship and thus avoide breathing in the ship's exhaust.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has concluded that diesel exhaust is just as carcinogenic as asbestos. The ultrafine particles, which are smaller than 0.1 micrometer can get into the smallest pulmonary alveoli and from there into the blood stream and other organs.

NABU manager Leif Miller argues it's cynical that the cruise ship companies "pay huge sums to improve entertainment and gastronomical services on board, but save as much as they can when it comes to environmental protection."

Meanwhile, in Germany the cruise ship industry is getting ready for the next season: In Warnemünde, Hamburg and Kiel alone, more than two million passengers are expected to board the giants of the seas in 2017.

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Israel divers find ancient marine cargo in Mediterranean

Yahoo – AFP, May 16, 2016

Artefacts from a merchant ship that sank off the ancient Mediterranean port of
Caesarea 1,600 years ago are presented to the press by Israel's Antiquities Authority
on May 16, 2016 (AFP Photo/Jack Guez)

Caesarea (Israel) (AFP) - Israel's Antiquities Authority on Monday displayed cargo from a merchant ship that sank off the ancient Mediterranean port of Caesarea 1,600 years ago, including rare bronze statues and thousands of coins.

The find, happened upon by two divers a few weeks ago who then alerted the authority, consisted primarily of "metal slated for recycling" borne on the ship from Caesarea in the late Roman period, IAA experts said.

But a storm at the entrance to Caesarea harbour crashed the large ship into the seawall and rocks, the IAA said, spilling the cargo into the sea and preserving the "exciting finds".

Artefacts recovered off the ancient Mediterranean port of Caesarea in Israel 

includes thousands of coins in two lumps weighing around 20 kilogrammes bearing

the images of Constantine the Great and of Licinius (AFP Photo/Jack Guez)

"Metal statues are rare archaeological finds because they were always melted down and recycled in antiquity," Jacob Sharvit, director of the Marine Archaeology Unit of the IAA and his deputy Dror Planer said in a joint statement, noting such a trove hasn't been found in Israel for 30 years.

The artefacts include "a bronze lamp depicting the image of the sun god Sol, a figurine of the moon goddess Luna, a lamp in the image of the head of an African slave (and) fragments of three life-size bronze cast statues," the IAA said.

There were also "objects fashioned in the shape of animals such as a whale (and) a bronze faucet in the form of a wild boar with a swan on its head," the statement said, noting the sand protected the statues which were "in an amazing state of preservation."

Items, which the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) estimate to be around 1600 

years old, are displayed after it was recovered from a merchant ship in the 

ancient harbor of the Caesarea National Park May 16, 2016. Reuters/ Baz Ratner

The find includes thousands of coins in two lumps weighing around 20 kilogrammes (44 pounds) bearing the images of Constantine the Great and of Licinius, an emperor who ruled the eastern half of the Roman Empire and was a rival of Constantine.

Fragments of drinking jars were also found, as well as iron anchors, apparently cast from the ship in the vain hope of preventing it crashing in the storm.

The discovery comes a year after the exposure of a record trove of some 2,000 gold coins in the same area, with Sharvit crediting the abundance of divers with the growing number of finds.

According to Sharvit and Planer, the finds reflect the "economic and commercial stability in the wake of the stability of the Roman Empire," a period in which "Christianity was on its way to becoming the official religion of the Roman Empire."

Belated win for coastal protection in Spain

Environmentalists have won a decade-long battle to halt construction of a mega-hotel in one of Spain's largest coastal protected areas. However, the conflict between tourism and conservation is far from over.

Deutsche Welle, 24 February 2016

El Algarrobico has been for a decade one of the most controversial buildings in Spain

It was a clear win for environmentalists when Spain's highest court ruled the construction of a mega-hotel 'illegal'.

Just 14 meters away from El Algarrobico, a pristine beach of Cabo de Gata in southern Spain, the hotel - with its 21 floors and 411 bedrooms - stands vacant.

Its construction in the province of Almeria was dubbed one of Spain's biggest environmental scandals.

The Spanish Supreme Court recently declared the area environmentally protected and has banned construction. Environmentalists have hailed the decision a great success. But, the victory may have come a bit late.

A decade of confusion

"The countdown for the demolition of the Algarrobico's hotel has finally started," said Andalusian environment minister José Fiscal.

His triumphant announcement comes after years of backtracking and legal ambiguity with many locals holding the regional government responsible for the whole fiasco.

It all began in the 1980s, when construction of the hotel was first licensed. Then, the coastal area was not protected. But by the time construction began in 2003, that had changed and building was prohibited.

The hotel is located in a protected area within the natural park, Cabo de Gata

It wasn’t until 2006 that a local court first ordered an immediate halt to building. But the national environment ministry and the regional government of Andalusia failed to react to the ruling.

Then in 2012, the high court of Andalusia declared the hotel illegal and called for its demolition. But two years later, the court reversed its decision. The hotel was legal and building free to restart.

Now, 10 years after works were halted, Spain's Supreme Court has finally given the green light for its demolition.

The price of the victory

Tearing down the huge edifice will cost an estimated 7 million euros. The national and local government are to split the bill.

There is also the outstanding question of compensation for the hotel’s owners – who are demanding around 70 million euros.

Locals feel they too have lost out financially.

While environmental groups have long fought the hotel, it has always had majority support in the area – mainly for economic reasons.

"Once it was already constructed, it would have been best to make use of it," said Salvador Hernández, mayor of the nearby village of Carboneras.

Hernández argues the hotel would have brought much needed jobs to the village. "Instead, the people – through taxes – will pay for its demolition, and the consequences," he told DW.

Hernández believes the local community has emerged the biggest loser from a debacle that put Carboneras on the map for all the wrong reasons.

"Our village may be outstanding for many reasons, but our image has been destroyed by this scandal," he lamented.

The natural park Cabo de Gata is the largest coastal protected area in Andalusia

An uncertain future

And the construction that has loomed over Algarrobico for more than a decade will not disappear overnight.

The demolition is expected to produce around 60,000 cubic meters of waste, of which at least 40,000 cubic meters must removed and dumped. The remainder is to be used in the area’s recovery

Greenpeace at least sees an upside to this logistical challenge.

"The demolition work would bring around 400 new jobs," said Pilar Marcos, head of Greenpeace Spain’s coastal campaign.

"98% of the materials could be recycled. Moreover, it represents a new opportunity for sustainable tourism."

What the beach will look like once the process is over remains an open question. Whether it will be restored to its natural state – or become the site for new tourism services has yet to be decided.

Massive tourism is visible all along the Spanish coast

Tourism threatens conservation

According to WWF, tourism is one of the main causes for biodiversity loss in the Mediterranean region. Sea beds, coastal landscapes and marine dynamics are all at risk.

Spain is one of the world’s best-loved tourist destinations. In 2014, it was ranked third in the world for numbers of foreign tourists by the United Nations Tourism Organization.

But threats to environment from tourism are a problem the world over, with Mexico, China, Ecuador, Indonesia and Nepal just a few of countries where vacationers put the landscapes they come to enjoy at risk.