The Ecological Beach: sustainable management of the Posidonia banquette along the Lazio shorelines
Every year seagrass wrack (from Posidonia oceanica) is deposited along the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea. The use of beaches for tourism purposes currently involves the removal of these deposits, which are negatively considered by stakeholders.
Therefore, coastal municipalities have adopted expensive interventions to periodically collect and dispose seagrass wrack over the past years. Beach cleaning can accelerate erosion and compromise the integrity of the coastal habitat, pushing local administrations to consequent and expensive coastal protection and beach nourishment interventions. The BARGAIN project aims to combine the needs of touristic exploitation of the beaches with the protection of coastal ecosystems, thanks to the pilot model of the ECOLOGICAL BEACH. Although the project took place in the Lazio Region, the methodological approach and results are exportable at national and international level. The present guidelines describe the different management strategies available for administrations to apply the Ecological Beach model and to avoid ecological and economic damages due to the treatment and disposal of seagrass wrack. The diffusion of this model improves the economic coastal activities, protect the coastal environments and disseminate the concept that Posidonia wrack represent a resource instead of a problem.
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