Mediterranean area

Greece -Kerkyra islands

Corfu (Kerkyra, in Greek) is the north-western most island in the Ionian sea, separated from the southern coast of Albania by a 2 km wide strait and is renowned for being the greenest of the approximately 3000 Greek islands.. Along the west coast, there are high cliffs and long sandy beaches, but very few rivers or water springs. On the opposite, the other coast are lower with some rivers, water springs, three large lagoons, some little ones and the last salina. In 1974, 30 % of the whole area was occupied by an old cultivated forest of olive trees, 30 % by other crops (vines, fruit, vegetables). Now the 100 000 inhabitants gave up farming on account of the tourism expansion. In 1991, 4374 charters and many ferries conveyed a million tourists from May to October. There is no intensive fish farming. Intensive livestock breeding or agriculture, maize, or industry. So chemical pollution seems to be low, except in the olive groves whore people use without circumspection a lot of toxic sprays (e.g.gramoxone) (1). The high humidity, caused by the high precipitation is contrasted by large numbers of sunny days. These climatic features favour lush vegetation exhibiting very high species diversity. Corfu exhibits wet winter months but dry and sunny summers with moderate temperatures. The annual rainfall is 1250 mm, twice that of a well known wet place in the world, London. At present, Corfu is a very popular tourist destination (2).