Are Strategic Investments necessarily also “large investments”?
Strategic Investments are those investments which, on account of their strategic weight for the national or local economy – with their main characteristics being the attraction of investment capital, integrated planning and the saving of natural resources – are capable of enhancing the showcasing of the country’s natural and cultural environment and its reconstruction, in accordance with the principles of balanced and sustainable development.
It is increasingly observed that major investments in tourism in our country are being developed through the organised framework of Strategic Investments.
At the same time, however, there appears to arise among local communities a concern – perhaps even an opinion – even more strongly for the small islands of the Cyclades, that Strategic Investments contribute to over-development, to the loss of cultural identity and to the degradation of the environment.
What must be understood is that the positive role of Strategic Investments in sustainable development derives from the framework of Strategic Investments, which exclusively provides the possibility of approving – scientifically and in a documented manner – unified urban planning with strict environmental terms, through the preparation of an ESCHASE and an SEIA and their approval by the issuance of a Presidential Decree. Through this procedure and the prior processing of the Presidential Decree by the Council of State, legal certainty is provided both to the investment itself and to the protection of the environment. Moreover, every Strategic Investment is obliged to draw up a plan of sustainable-development principles on the basis of “ESG” criteria, as well as an annual sustainability report (“sustainability reporting”).
This is confirmed, moreover, by the Council of State, which has assessed positively the urban-planning tool of the ESCHASE as a “tool of sustainable development” that satisfies the Constitution’s pursuit of the organised siting of activities, instead of “unplanned and scattered” out-of-plan building (see CoS 2564/2022).