Studies of environmental coastal impacts in small islands: a review

Abstract

Fragile or closed maritime-terrestrial ecosystems of small islands, where the intromission of entropies can damage the ecosystem's stability, have been harmed by human intervention. This systematic review examines studies concentrating on anthropogenic impacts on the coastal environments of small islands. Based on a keyword search, a total of 507 papers were found for the period 1985-2021. The North Atlantic and North Pacific islands were the most studied. Studies assessing the typologies of human impacts and ecosystem services were the most numerous. Climate change, environmental policy, and tourism and recreation, together with biological transformations, were the most studied sources of environmental problems in marine-terrestrial environments. Others studied to a lesser extent include industry, basic activities such as agriculture, fishing or mariculture, certain coastal infrastructures, marine litter, human settlements, maritime trade, extractive activities or the protected status of natural areas and the resulting conflicts with local agents.