More than 38 780 hectares of land in the Nessebar region have been taken out of the list for inclusion in Natura 2000 environmental network.

The decision was taken during a meeting of the national bio-diversity council, an Environment and Water Affairs Ministry press release said.

Resort territories, as well as populated areas have been taken out of the Natura 2000 list, Bulgarian news agency BTA reported.

Nessebar municipal council head Dimitar Yankov said that despite the changes, the criteria used to draft an ecological map for the region were unclear.

Such decision needed to be taken by a committee of independent ecological experts, said Yankov.

Yankov said that before the corrections, the provisional list covered 100 per cent of the Nessebar municiapality. Total inclusion could be detrimental to the development of Bulgarian tourism, said Yankov.