EEA: 95.8% of Greece’s Swimming Waters of Exceptional Quality

Beach on Koufonissia.

Days after Greece ranked second among 52 countries for the quality of its beaches on the Blue Flags listing, the European Environment Agency (EEA) announced that 95.8 percent of the country’s swimming waters were of excellent quality in 2023.

The report, released jointly with the European Commission, highlights where swimmers can find safe bathing sites in Europe after assessment of bacteria levels.

Greece ranks fourth in Europe for its excellent bathing waters after Cyprus (97.6 percent), Croatia (96.7 percent), and Austria (96.9 percent) and in fifth place Bulgaria with 94.8 percent.

Greece dropped in the ranking from third spot in 2022 which it held for four consecutive years.

More specifically, according to the report which assesses where swimmers can find the cleanest bathing sites in Europe this summer, 95 percent of Greece’s bathing water was found to be “excellent”, placing the country third among 29 countries including sites in all EU member states, Albania and Switzerland. Quality grades awarded are “excellent”, “good”, “sufficient”, or “poor”.

Trend of coastal bathing water quality in Greece. Notes: Each column represents an absolute number of bathing waters in the season. Quality classes “good” and “sufficient” are merged for comparability with the classification of the preceding Bathing Water Directive 76/160/EEC. Source: EEA

Countries where bathing water met the minimum quality standards were in Belgium, Bulgaria, Luxembourg, Malta, Austria, and Romania.

The overwhelming majority of sites across Europe met the quality standards for swimming waters at 85.4 percent while 96 percent of all officially recognized bathing waters met the minimum quality standards with only 1.5 percent being characterized as “poor.”

Source: European Environment Agency

“Continued regular monitoring by the member states of our coastal waters, rivers and lakes and other freshwater will be crucial for our health and wellbeing and for the environment as climate change is leading to more extreme weather like heavy rains which can negatively impact water quality,” said EEA Executive director Leena Ylä-Mononen.

The share of ‘excellent’ swimming sites across the EU has grown with 85 percent of all sites achieving ‘excellent’ status over the last few years while the number of bathing sites with poor quality waters has dropped since the adoption of the EU’s Bathing Water Directive in 2006.