A report from a European Commission study has revealed that almost half of Cyprus?s land is looming in the possibility of desertification.
This puts the island nation on the second rank in this regard, with Spain?s 53% land at the first place and Greece?s 35% at the second.
Cyprus was also found to have the largest percentage of people living in habitable areas influenced by desertification. The approximate number for this is estimated to be 700,000 people i.e. roughly 61% of the total population.
Other countries that top this list include Romania and Bulgaria, having 39 and 37 per cent land under desertification, respectively.
As of 2026, 15% of the lands in the European Union are drylands, covering roughly 611,000 square kilometers of land. 530,000 out of these are currently under desertification, which impacts over forty-two million people in total.
