A request for an urgent Regional Council discussion raises questions about the committee responsible for coordinating the UNESCO-designated reserve, including its meetings, decisions, and how it handles funded activities.
The Asterousia Mountains have an internationally recognized environmental status, but a new complaint asks a basic question: who is actually making the decisions?
Michalis Spyridakis, president of the Messara Associations Network and a member of the local coordinating structure for the Asterousia Biosphere Reserve, has submitted an urgent request that the Regional Council of Crete discuss the matter.
His complaint alleges that the Coordinating Committee for the Asterousia Biosphere Reserve has never been formally constituted as a functioning body and has remained inactive for five to six years.
The authorities involved now need to examine that allegation.
The issue matters because Asterousia has been part of UNESCO’s World Network of Biosphere Reserves since 2020. UNESCO itself describes biosphere reserves as places where conservation, sustainable development, research and local communities are supposed to work together.
The Documents Spyridakis Says He Cannot Find
Spyridakis says he requested administrative documents concerning the reserve on June 30, 2026.
He says the Development Agency of Heraklion subsequently provided documentation concerning activities and spending supported by the agency, but that the material did not include the corresponding decisions of the coordinating committee for activities funded between 2020 and 2025.
Among the documents he says he has not received are:
- minutes showing the formal constitution of the coordinating committee;
- minutes of its meetings;
- decisions concerning funded activities;
- decisions concerning the operation and management of the reserve;
- activity reports and action plans;
- decisions assigning projects, studies or services;
- and the current management or strategic plan, if one exists.
That is the heart of the complaint.
If the committee has been meeting, where are the records? If it has not been meeting, who has been making the decisions?
The Money Question
Spyridakis also raises questions about several activities financed through the Development Agency of Heraklion.
One example concerns the Asterousia Hybrid University, which has been organized over several years in cooperation with MIO-ECSDE.
Here, there is an important piece of independent context: UNESCO itself confirms the program exists and describes MIO-ECSDE as a co-organizer. UNESCO’s documentation lists editions from 2020 through 2025–2026 and says the program is designed around education and training concerning biosphere reserves and other UNESCO-designated sites.
UNESCO actually classifies the 2025–2026 edition as “Seminar and training”, rather than as a university in the conventional academic sense.
Spyridakis questions the expenditure associated with these activities and asks what decisions authorized particular payments.
He lists six payments to MIO-ECSDE between 2020 and 2025, totaling approximately €132,866 including VAT, according to the figures contained in his complaint.
He also raises questions about payments to other organizations involved in the Asterousia structure.
Those allegations should be distinguished from the existence of the programs themselves. UNESCO confirms that the Hybrid University has been running and that the Asterousia Biosphere Reserve and regional authorities have been partners since 2020.
The unresolved question is therefore not whether the activities happened, but what administrative decisions authorized them and whether the relevant governance procedures were followed.
UNESCO Status Is Not Just a Logo
A biosphere reserve is supposed to connect environmental protection with sustainable development and community participation. UNESCO describes the reserves as “living laboratories” where sustainable-development approaches can be developed and tested.
Asterousia has continued to attract projects and international attention. In February 2026, the Region of Crete approved a €350,000 project for a new Asterousia Biosphere Reserve information center in Kapetaniana, with the Municipality of Gortyna as beneficiary.
UNESCO also documented the 2025–2026 Asterousia Hybrid University, which brought together postgraduate students, educators, researchers and site managers from the Mediterranean and southeastern Europe. So there is clearly activity around the reserve.
The complaint asks whether the formal local governance structure tracking that activity is functioning as it should.
The Accusation of Losing UNESCO Recognition
Spyridakis and several reports describing his intervention have raised the possibility that Asterousia could lose its international UNESCO status because of the alleged inactivity.
That is a serious claim, but it should remain a claim until the relevant UNESCO review process or authority confirms an actual risk to the designation.
What is documented is that Asterousia remains part of UNESCO’s World Network of Biosphere Reserves and that UNESCO continued documenting activities there through 2025–2026.
The immediate issue, therefore, is simpler and considerably more useful:
Will the Region of Crete put the governance questions on the table and produce the documents?
Spyridakis is asking that the issue be placed on the agenda of the next Regional Council meeting and that representatives of the Region and the municipalities involved in the coordinating committee explain its status.
He is also calling for the committee to be formally constituted, for a timetable of actions to be established and for regular public reporting to the local community.
