5 March 2008 | One of Albania’s chief potential tourist attractions – its coastline, may soon receive a boost in the form of a Blue Flag recognition, if growing solid and wastewater treatment issues are addressed.

The Blue Flag status in granted to beaches that correspond to strict water quality criteria. It is awarded by the Copenhagen-based NGO Foundation for Environmental Education. Albania is the only country in Europe with a sea coast that doesn’t have a single blue-flagged beach, the IPS news agency recently reported.

Albania’s coastline on the Adriatic and Ionian Seas stretches over nearly 400 kilometres and though the country remains the least developed in Europe, it is already suffering from uncontrolled overdevelopment along its coasts, including on places where normal road infrastructure does not exist. There is a lack of proper sewage treatment facilities. Solid waste disposal systems are badly organised and unregulated dumping of garbage damage the quality of the landscape.

The initiative is expected to not only help Albania to attract more tourists, but also to engage local communities in working to keep their surroundings clean.

“The blue flag system in itself is a tourist attraction,” Lauren Bohatka, the UNDP's eco-tourism programme manager told IPS. “Tourists who spot a beautiful beach from the road will no longer have to face the disappointment of finding a neglected site.”

In addition, the initiative may give a much-needed push for Albanians to become involved in cleaning activities, which were largely dropped with the fall of communism in 1991 and are now perceived as having been imposed by the fallen regime.

“The best thing is that it stirs up community pride; after the first community does it others will want to do the same, and it will start a little competition,” Bohatka added. “Once communities get [the blue flag] standing they don't want to let it go, and hopefully it will also inspire other entrepreneurial activities.”

Currently, Albania’s government, supported by the World Bank, has began an Integrated Coastal Zone Management and Clean-up Project whose successful conclusion would do much to turn the Blue Flag project into a concrete reality, IPS reported.