In our struggle against land and ocean grabs and fortress conservation, we are being intimidated and threatened; we ask for solidarity and support from the ICCA Consortium members and community-based organizations
First published on 10/27/2024, and last updated on 12/04/2024
By Terra Sylvestris, ICCA Consortium Member
Our native communities on Kalamos and Kastos islands in Greece are at the center of the Inner Ionian Marine Protected Area, one of Greece’s largest marine protected areas and one of the largest in the Mediterranean.
For centuries, the people of these two islands have been the guardians of their aquatic territories, managing and sustaining them in a way that allowed the preservation of unique and iconic megafauna. Their sustainable practices have ensured the survival of monk seals, endangered dolphins, and even whales in what used to be some of the richest fishing grounds in the Mediterranean.
However, later, policies and practices by the state and some conservation initiatives systematically removed the power from the islands’ people and gave it to government agencies. At the same time, those initiatives have been catalyzing the area’s settlement by non-native groups that had no prior connection to the sea, ignoring historical rights and granting fishing licenses to people from outside the region or country.
Government policies have depopulated our islands of their original inhabitants in the past. Our native population is 250 now, while fifty years ago, it was two thousand.
The pattern over the past 150 years or so has been clear. First, a process of nationalizing commons takes place, followed by the state essentially handing such management over to private entities because it finds itself incompetent to manage the territories for conservation.
Over the past two decades, the area has seen the rise of aquaculture, a practice that has led to the destruction of wild fish spawning sites. This, coupled with labor from non-Indigenous groups and activities like recreational fishing, trawling, and illegal fishing, has posed a serious threat to the island’s conservation efforts.
To fight back, we have founded our organization, Terra Sylvestris. The organization was founded in 2014 by the local people of the islands in response to the continual aggression by non-native groups, large corporations, and related state agencies.
At Terra Sylvestris, we work to protect our ancestral lands and waters and our rights as traditional native communities of Kalamos and Kastos islands in the Ionian Sea. Our mission is to contribute to reversing the current trend of losing biological diversity and natural and semi-natural ecosystems.
Ours is a grassroots non-profit organization run by people of the Greek islands. We mobilize support for our communities and strengthen collective efforts against the environmental degradation caused in our region, working towards a tangible difference in the lives of our people.
We resist the aggressions of unsustainable and harmful industries, such as industrial fishing, aquaculture, and wind farming. These harmful industries are expanding against the will of our people and causing significant damage to the ecology of our region, affecting our communities in profound ways. We also resist conservation models that are not data-driven and don’t follow optimal models that include the community in decision-making.
Our organization conducts scientific research, raises awareness, empowers the community, facilitates legal proceedings in law courts, and organizes peaceful protests and other civil actions. These activities are executed through the organization’s Kalamos and Kastos Sustainable Development Program.
We are concerned that industrial aquaculture and other industries are violating the rights of native communities to natural resources on the islands of Kalamos and Kastos. Through the Kalamos and Kastos Sustainable Development program, the organization aims to halt and reverse this trend, restore ecosystems, promote sustainable development, and bring environmental justice to our people.
Our organization’s work is driven by the dedication of our board members, local and visiting volunteers (field volunteers), and volunteers working remotely (online and over the phone).
At present, we have three regular members, all from the islands, and several supporters and volunteers from the islands, as well as elsewhere in Greece and the world.
We aim to halt and reverse the abovementioned trend, giving control of the waters back to its people and protecting the terrestrial and marine biodiversity.
However, in recent years, we have faced significant obstacles created by big international and national non-government organizations (NGOs) who have either started to come in from outside or were present in a more limited manner before and are in a gold rush in our area for funds and power.
These NGOs’ top-down approaches and relationships with aquaculture and oil and gas exploration industries have resulted in fortress conservation initiatives and more land and water grabbing. Much more is about to take place, further legitimizing and empowering highly environmentally destructive industries.
Our area is undergoing zoning and advancement for various industries and uses. This is not in line with data-driven community-based conservation but represents an approach that primarily tries to legitimize the presence of industries like fish farming and allow fortress-conservation areas to take over commons.
The area of the inner Ionian, once considered of medium importance for global conservation, is currently teeming with organizations aspiring to become government contractors in the context of the inner Ionian protected area. Some attempts to legitimize their presence in the region by using labels such as bottom-up approach and community-based conservation are apparent responses to them being considered the opposite by the actual community-based organizations and local communities.
Some organizations, part of an unofficial alliance, have tried to rebrand themselves as community-based to legitimize their presence in our ancestral territories and misrepresent the community’s consent and the benefits of their projects. They started pursuing such approaches after leaders of those organizations failed to convince our organization to join or support their top-down initiatives.
Our organization has faced intimidation by people from the conservation industry for resisting their exclusionary projects. The intimidation campaigns against our organizations are organized and threaten our safety and security.
In this context, we appeal to the ICCA Consortium’s member organizations and other community-based organizations in Europe and beyond for solidarity and support.