SUSTAINABLE DUNE TOURISM ON THE CURONIAN SPIT: MANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES

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SUSTAINABLE DUNE TOURISM ON THE CURONIAN
SPITMANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES

• Aurine Armaitiene, Ramunas Povilanskas
• Klaipeda University, Lithuania

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Contents

• Introduction
• Approach
• The study area
• Results
• Conclusions

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Introduction

• The main attention in the environmental
  management in recent decades is paid to the
  identification and assessment of the essential
  principles of the sustainable development
• The necessity to identify and follow the
  principles of sustainable development is the key
  prerequisite of the integrated coastal management
• It is self-evident that management is basically
  integrated where plans, programmes and measures
  are thought of in such a way as to optimize
  sustainable development

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Introduction

• According to A. Vallega (1999), this implies the
  content of management in terms of resource use
  patterns, organization of decision making
  centres, protection and conservation of the
  environment and cultural heritage, social
  participation, and other being designed in such
  a way as to optimize efforts to pursue
  sustainable development
• In short, coastal management is integrated where
  its specific goals are strictly correlated with
  the pursuit of the integrity of the ecosystem,
  economic efficiency and social equity

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Approach

• The emergence of principles of the integrated
  coastal management result largely from the major
  change in the cultural and cognitive paradigm of
  nature, i.e., the shift from the
  anthropocentric to biocentric ordering of the
  nature.
• The evolution of cultural concepts of the
  European dune landscapes is the best example of
  such a shift from alien and evil force to be
  overcome to almost sacred, positive landscape
  with outstanding cognitive and ecological values
• Besides other ecological and aesthetic values,
  shifting dunes became appreciated as a valuable
  tourism resource in recent decades

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The study area

• The varied and a very dynamic landscape with high
  biological diversity is a distinctive feature of
  the Curonian Spit on a regional scale
• The 33-km long ridge of 4060 m high shifting
  Curonian dunes is the second-longest coastal
  ridge of shifting dunes in Europe
• It is protected as a cross-border strict nature
  reserve within the Kurshskaya kosa national park
  on the Russian side of the spit and Kuriu nerija
  national park on the Lithuanian side.

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The study area
Due to its unique blend of nature and culture
values, the whole Curonian Spit was in 2000
included into the UNESCO World Heritage List as a
single cross-border cultural landscape of
shifting and forested dunes of outstanding
international importance, which is under constant
threat from natural forces
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The study area
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Results

• Our investigations reveal that even the slightest
  invasion of recreation facilities into the
  shifting dunes of the Curonian Spit disturbs
  smooth flows of energy and matter and of the
  biotic information within the strip seascapes of
  the shifting dunes
• Thus, the invasion of recreation facilities into
  the shifting dunes is one of the critical agents
  (integrity thresholds) for the robust sustainable
  development of the shifting dune seascapes

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Conclusions

• It is necessary to change functional zoning
  principles of the Curonian Spit and draw the
  functional zones according to the gradient
  boundaries of the strip seascapes (i.e., along
  the longitudinal axes of the strip seascapes of
  the Curonian Spit instead of the current
  functional divides along the perpendicular axes)
• As a consequent result of such changes should be
  a radical change towards regulation of the dune
  tourism on the Curonian Spit

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Conclusions

• It is necessary to abolish any restrictions for
  tourists to enter and travel across the sandy
  plain (palve) of the Curonian Spit freely within
  the strict nature reserves combining their
  itineraries with limited and regulated
  possibilities to ascend and enjoy the highest
  shifting dunes of the Curonian dune ridge
• Tourist flows on palve will control the
  proliferation of the forest and brushwood and
  enhance the supply of sand from the palve to the
  shifting dunes

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Thank you for your attention!