Kvarken added to world heritage list

Together with 8 other sites, among which a Mexican landscape of blue agave that gives the world the tequila spirit, Kvarken was added to UNESCO's world heritage list yesterday. The archipelago is added as an extension to an already existing site, namely the High Coast of Sweden. The following is a statement of the World Heritage Committee:

It [Kvarken Archipelago] features unusual ridged washboard moraines, “De Greer moraines”, formed by the melting of the continental ice sheet, 10,000 to 24,000 years ago. The Archipelago is continuously rising from the sea in a process of rapid glacio-isostatic uplift, whereby the land, previously weighed down under the weight of a glacier, lifts at rates that are among the highest in the world. As a consequence of the advancing shoreline, islands appear and unite, peninsulas expand, lakes evolve from bays and develop into marshes and peat fens. This property is essentially a “type area” for research on isostacy; the phenomenon having been first recognized and studied here.