Blue Flag

The Blue Flag is an international award that is being granted on a yearly basis by the Foundation for Environmental Education (FEE) to beaches and leisure ports as a distinction for high environmental quality, good services and security for visitors.

The Blue Flag campaign is an independent project and completely voluntary and takes place on an annual basis in over 30 countries, mainly European countries, with the participation of over 1,000 coastal municipalities.

The FEE is a non-profit organisation that aims to foster the awareness and the environmental education by means of implementing international programmes encouraging environmental awareness and sustainable development.

The Blue Flag is closely related to the coordinated actions undertaken on four different levels: local, regional, statal and international that, as a group, promote, develop and favour actions aiming for the sustainable environmental management of the coastal areas of the municipality.

Thus, a Blue Flag on a beach acknowledges and encourages the efforts undertaken by the town councils to meet certain regulatory criteria (Coastal Law, Directive of Bathing Waters, Directive of urban waste water, etc.), of cleaning and security and with adequate environmental information and management. This award must be renewed on a yearly basis.

The Blue Flag Campaign aims that the norms for hygiene, health and environmental norms, that are required by the effective regulation to ensure security and well-being of visitors, are being met on crowded beaches.