Continued degradation of Durres bay

TIRANA, April 10 – Urban waste continues to be a problem for the environment in Albania and the recent problem caused in the western port city of Durres is a clear example of that.
Scores of tons of waste polluted the whole bay, an important shore for tourists in summer time. It was learned that the waste came from two rivers just north of the bay and they were collected in the capital.
The pollution of the Durres coast turned into a big problem and local authorities tried to clean it. They also called on the central government to assist them as they could not manage to cope with that amount of waste arriving in their coast.
A year ago Croatia complained that waste coming from Albania had polluted its coast. Tirana did not accept that accusation.
Tourism has been spotted by the government as a main priority. The Durres beach is the biggest in the country ‘absorbing’ hundreds of thousands of tourists every year.
Albanian authorities say that the most delicate zones are the rivers outfalls, where all the wastes carried along by the river flow are deposited. They acknowledge that the Albanian coast suffers the consequences of mismanagement of the wastes.