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 Introduction

The Province of Ikaria (islands Ikaria and Fourni) belongs to the Prefecture of Samos, and Samos is one of the three Prefectures of the Periphery of North Egean Sea (Samos, Chios, Lesvos)

It is the most understudied LORE partner with serious underdevelopment problems. The mountainous long and medium sized island of Ikaria has most of the settlements off-shore, and on the mountain. The settlements themselves consist of scattered households with only recent village-centre formations and coastal settlement developments. It is unique in all the Egean Sea in having no physical port, a fact which affected the local lifestyle through history. Being an exile site for Byzantine and recent (up to 1949) political opponents, the island has purposefully remained underdeveloped. Out migration is heavy (one fourth of the Islanders remains in the Province) however population has stabilized to 7500 inhabitants in Ikaria Island, and 1500 inh in the Fourni islets.

An important social “deregulation” is detected, which threatens social coherence. This “deregulation” is facilitated by physical planning approaches and investments which address to the coastal area or the Capital City (Agios Kyrikos). In addition there is no functional or integral relationship between the recent public works themselves and with the social-economic context in which they are executed. The main cause is that the decisions concerning the island are taken elsewhere. Ikaria, in addition, has very weak political or “lobbying” strength.

Three examples:

1.An airport was constructed and is in use since 1995. However the road that connects the airport with the rest of the island is still under construction and unpaved.

2.A huge (for the scale of the area of Raches) Dam was constructed and is presently full of water (since 1996). However it is of no use because there was made no connection whatsoever as of what to water. A relative study has been only recently publicly tendered and there is no answer to the question of “who is going to pay” for the difficult watering network that is needed, and to “when” the Dam will become useful.

The location of the Dam on top of a very delicate gorge with high aesthetic value raises environmental concern for the impact on the local hydrological cycle.

3.A Special Regional Planning Study for Ikaria by the Ministry of Environment, Regional Planning and Public Works paid by ENVIREG stressed attention to the urbanistic regulations of the coastal zone leaving the mountainous land uses out of sight, overgrazed, abandoned, under fires, under a serious desertification process, facilitated by the abandonment of traditional agricultural practices in slopy and mountainous premises.

It has the renown Spas of Ikaria.

Everywhere there are applied traditional agricultural practices which are in conformity with the promoted by E.U. biological cultivations. However people do not know it.

The mountainous range has the best European scores in wind power.

Some particular products (honey, goat meat, wine from the local variety of Phokianos grape, a special variety of olive, goat leather, local varieties of cheese, aromatic plants, local fishery, almonds, mushrooms, a local variety of appricot etc) are below quality and market standards.

How Ikaria can be integrated because of her particularities in the overall european context?

TERRA programme offers a unique opportunity to Ikaria. The bottom-up approach which characterizes the TERRA architecture is appropriate for such deregulated, desorganised environments as Ikaria is, to be restructured, to make some critical, delicate, appropriate advances in order to be raised as equals, with their particularities and their pride, as a modern presence in the mosaic of Europe. A task which is heavily social along with being physical-spacial. A task which demands an initial inflow of aid to be given to nodal-pilot interventions under an overall developmental umbrella. If this task can be fulfilled (a matter of setting an observatory mechanism) Ikaria will be in a better position for appropriate-soft development.

However, the aid needed is not necessarily in economic terms. With TERRA Ikaria has the chance to make a breakthrough to isolation and communicate with others, and this is what Local-Regional Observatory Network is about, not only for Ikaria but for all present and future partners.

A next question is “how” to approach a difficult and remote society. To this end TERRA-LORE is facilitated by a series of activities done in 1995-1997 under the title “What is the most appropriate future for Ikaria?”

A land use and local activity pilot model is proposed to show to the local authorities and the population that many things can be done only if the local society is willing to make them. However, it is not only the actions themselves that are worth trying, but the whole social “sensitivitisation”. If local social resources will be mobilized then one should expect the reveal of a serious power which is now in hypnosis and degrading.

All this means “openess” to the world and to the new economic, production and technological advances. However, it also means “openess” to the world of tradition, to the local “ways” which are well adapted to this particular environment.

To combine both is a difficult task. And it can be done only if the local population understands what is going on in the world and tries to adapt the old ways in order to keep them.

The structure of the proposal of Ikaria’s workplan contains one basic axis. The design and formulation of a Local Development Programme in cooperation with the local authorities. A participation process is proposed, which is also a study and a proposition of coexisting and of having an orientation for the next 10 years. But to consent one must “see”, one must know. Therefore, some specific pilot studies will be conducted as local potential armature. Most important, a pilot intervention will be done to the mountainous community of Arethoussa, aiming at three goals: Desertification (represented by overgrazing and piloted by a land use managment action and the potential of transforming a meat-oriennted pasture towards producing dairy products as well), isolation ( piloted by creating a tele-working centre in the village), and soft development (piloted by creating a guest house and selective path intervention).

However, the geographic context of Ikaria does not permit dissemination of the LORE actions and activities. This is why is proposed the internal networking of all the 11 Communities and 2 Municipalities with the Provincial Office and with LORE Network. This will help news to disseminate. In parallel, a series of activities is proposed dealing with promotion, local information days, pamphlets, guides, videos and other material.

Since the Ikaria-LORE approach is a social mobilization approach as long as physical-spatial one must invent a means to measure if the goal is achieved. In parallel with the individual observations of each action/activity and its results, a questionnaire comparative study is proposed for the starting and ending period of TERRA-LORE. This questionnaire approach, typically sociological, will provide a sound scientific ground for monitoring, measuring, estimating the results of the two year TERRA effort.

Ikaria also proposes an insight as of the continuation of LORE network after the end of the TERRA programme, which is also budgeted at the final phase.

What if some of all these fail to be achieved? Although this will be very awkward for Ikaria, to know the exact reasons of any failure (as well as of any success) and to be able to communicate them to the other partners is essential. One should consider not only the social and economic actors, but also the legislative ones, as well as the complex of planning and decision levels acting in local settings.

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