Mid-Term Review Meeting on CAMP Cyprus

On February 16, 2007 a mid-term review meeting on CAMP Cyprus has been co-organised by the Cypriot Ministry for Agriculture, Natural Resources and Environment, and PAP/RAC. The CAMP activities' Team Leaders, the CAMP Task Manager and National Specialists participated in the meeting as well. Detailed information on the CAMP work programme accomplished so far was exchanged, an agreement was made with Team Leaders and National Specialists on the expected final achievements of the CAMP, and the follow-up actions until the termination of the CAMP were discussed.

Major pressures on the Cypriot coast were first elaborated, with aggressive actions of land developers being considered the most prominent one. The participants agreed that ICZM might be a powerful framework for solving these issues. Overarching CAMP activity - ICZM - was mostly finalised at the time of the meeting. It was noted that one of the major CAMP objectives has already been achieved: lively co-operation between Cypriot ministries and ministerial departments since the inception of the CAMP was maintained and should be continued.

The next stage of the CAMP will seek for systematic inclusion of some ICZM tools - SEA, CCA for tourism, Environmental Economics - into the national policy framework and decision-making process. This is expected to be a rather simple task for SEA activity because of the obligation of the host country to implement the EU Directive on SEA. However, Cypriot experience with CCA for tourism as a potential ICZM tool is quite different - although several CCA studies have been prepared in 1990s, the Government did not make further use of CCA in the national decision-making process. The CAMP offers a renewed opportunity in this sense. The final meeting conclusion was that despite a certain delay in implementation (caused by a prolonged process of selecting National Specialists) CAMP is well under way, and is expected to contribute to a change in the national policies towards the coast and environment.