BANGKOK, Oct. 5 (Xinhua) -- The famous Maya Bay of Ko Phi Phi Leh island in the Gulf of Thailand will be closed indefinitely in order to reverse the damage caused by too many tourists, media reported.
Having been featured in the 2000 film The Beach starring Leonardo DiCaprio, the island has since become one of the country's most attractive tourist destinations, receiving up to 5,000 tourists daily, more than double its capacity.
Due to the overload of tourists, about 80 percent of the coral around the Maya Bay has been destroyed.
"We need a time-out for the beach," marine scientist Thon Thamrongnawasawat said earlier this year. "Overworked and tired, all the beauty of the beach is gone."
The beach was closed by the Thai authority in early June, but the closure will extend at least a year since the four months were not long enough to save the environment.
"It's very difficult to remedy and rehabilitate because its beach was completely destroyed as well the plants which cover it," said Songtam Suksawang, the director of Thailand's national parks department.
Although rehabilitation might be difficult, the measure was necessary for the long term.
"If we continue to exploit the natural heritage until it is beyond recovery, tourism would completely end since no one would come anymore," Suksawang told The Nation newspaper.
Thailand is not the only country in the region which is facing overcrowdedness. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte described his country's most famous beach Boracay as a "cesspool" and closed it for six months in April, while Indonesia declared a "garbage emergency" last year along a stretch of the island of Bali.
