Environmental pressure on Cyprus will only increase

With 2025 coming to a close, Cyprus is leaving behind a year during which the environment was one of the – quite literally – hottest topics on the island.

Worries over persisting water scarcity and the corresponding consequences for local farming and drinking water supplies, record summer with temperatures climbing above 45 degrees Celsius, the Limassol forest fires in July and their devastating consequences – and the most recent, heavy rain that caused floods in various parts of the island.

Meanwhile, Paphos counted at least 540 illegal rubbish dumps, office furniture from state authorities was found carelessly dumped in a field in Yeri, an audit report concluded the financial mismanagement of the sustainable development plan for Akamas and our sandy beaches have become plastic collection points.

Yet, if relevant measures are implemented, further environmental stressors could be tackled, or at least minimised.

Making environmental issues a government priority could help ease pressure on the local ecosystem – and society in general – which is precisely the issue.

Identifying the causes of environmental pressure or worse, disasters, is a time-consuming undertaking. It often results in a balancing act between an infinite blame-game and the legitimate demand to hold those responsible to account.

Pressure is usually the only way to achieve lasting change, and this is where external controlling mechanisms come into place.

An audit report published in August 2025 determined “a significant reluctance on the part of the [Cypriot] state to adopt drastic and immediate measures” to counter environmental violations.

And, as is the case with European member states, the EU often steps in as another instigator of that pressure.

As of December 2025, the European Commission has launched ten active infringement procedures against Cyprus relating to environmental policies.

“For years the European Commission has identified that in Cyprus there is a systemic abuse of Article 6.3 of the Habitats Directive regarding the environmental appropriate assessment of projects in Cyprus,” BirdLife campaign coordinator Tassos Shialis told the Cyprus Mail in August.

The infringement cases filed against Cyprus range from the non-compliant operation of various landfills to the “bad application” of directives regarding landfills, emissions and waste.

These infringement cases include severe issues which put pressure on the island’s environment.

While it needs to be mentioned that other member states including Austria and Belgium face similar numbers of infringement procedures, the cases faced by Cyprus have in most cases already proceeded to the second or third stage of the procedure.

This means that Cyprus has not taken action despite the EU having sent a relevant formal notice or letter of reasoned opinion, in which it requests the country to initiate corrective action – and inevitably brings up the question on why this is the case.

“At a critical moment like this, the government did not respond as it should have,” President Nikos Christodoulides said in a televised address following the summer’s devastating Limassol wildfires.

He said the government was committed to examine if, how and why things worked or did not work the way they did, and promised that the findings would be made public. And in fact, they were, with the government soon after deciding to transfer control of forest firefighting duties to the interior ministry.

While decision was clearly made in an attempt to improve workflows and preparedness for future fires, it was met with criticism by forestry department head Savvas Iezekiel, who warned of its “adverse and irreversible effects”.

The whole scenario seemed like a rushed – and slightly clumsy – attempt to show that the government is implementing publicly demanded changes, a performance of responsibility, whose efficiency is yet to be proven.

In a recent debate on the government’s budget for 2026, Ecologists Movement MP Charalambos Theopemptou warned that Cyprus remained far from meeting its EU obligations, pointing to persisting failures in waste management and energy policy.

One of the examples he mentioned, was that almost two years after the EU deadline for separate collection of organic waste, implementation remains negligible and that despite organic waste accounting for approximately 40 per cent of household rubbish, Cyprus still lacks a meaningful nationwide waste management system, despite years of preparation time.

The existence of legal frameworks and governmental priorities is an important part of the equation.

With Cyprus rushing to prepare for the rotating presidency of the EU council, many projects which had long been put on hold were finished, including major works on roads and the creation of modern bus stops, which until now were either inexistent or lacking seating options.

It is unlikely this will encourage Cypriots to switch to buses and use their cars less, given the current public transport schedules. And guess what? None of the new bus stops have rubbish bins. Energy drink cans and food waste have already piled up at several of them. How could this have been overlooked at the planning stage?

Concluding this inventory of environmental issues on the island, I raise the question of where government responsibility begins and ends.

The Limassol fires are a great example of this. Reports by American investigators commissioned by Christodoulides eventually determined that discarded cigarettes were the cause of the fires.

“The cause of the fire was a carelessly discarded cigarette coming into contact with dry vegetation,” the report read.

Provocatively, one might ask why people continue to dispose of cigarettes in the environment in 2025.

Governments have a dual responsibility: to inform the public and to enforce legislation. This includes fining people who dump rubbish, whether it is old furniture or a soft drink can – and making environmental issues a priority is imperative to this.