Land use - National Responses (Greece)

In the late 1990s, the new generation of planning legislation in Greece (Table 2) enabled the country to take a comprehensive and rational approach to organising its national and local territories for the benefit of economic development, social cohesion and its natural and cultural heritage.

It has taken almost a decade and a large effort for the concepts of Laws 2508/1997 and 2742/1999 to be translated into the current set of framework and urban plans. This planning regime needs to be completed and put into practice. Completion of the Cadastre and the National Forest Registry will be part of the answer, as they will facilitate a more effective control of land development. Completion of the cadastre takes longer than originally anticipated (expected to finish in 2018). Through the completion of the National Forest Registry (expected in 2012), forests may be safeguarded and forest fires by arson may be limited.

Figure 1.          Relative contribution of land-cover categories in Greece taken by urban and other

                                artificial land development, 1990–2000 (EEA, 2010a,b)

Figure 2.          Annual land take by several types of human activity in Greece

                           (Data source: LEAC DB (based on CLC CHANGE DB); EEA, 2010a,b)

Figure 3.          Mean annual urban land take in Greece, as % of total Europe-23 urban land take

                 1990-2000 (Data source: LEAC DB (based on CLC CHANGE DB); EEA, 2010a,b)

Figure 4.          Mean annual urban land take in Greece, as % of 1990 artificial land (Data source:

                                 LEAC DB (based on CLC CHANGE DB), Corine Land Cover (CLC) 1990 and 2000,

                                 ETC/TE; EEA, 2010a,b)

Figure 5.          Forest transfer to Agriculture cover types, 1990-2000