The 20th century marked Lesvos’ annexation to the Greek State (1912) and a major economic crisis that broke out in 1922,when refugees from Asia Minor were ‘exchanged’ with Muslim inhabitants of the island and the borders for all transactions, movements and investments were closed down. As mentioned earlier, the greater socioeconomic context such as the introduction of steam ships and motorboats that made stops in small ports unnecessary and the improvement of land transportation deepened the crisis. The result for Lesvos was the closing of almost all industrial and trading activities on the island and a major population exodus.These developments affected land uses greatly. Almost all
cultivations except for olives declined (in 1959 olives represent 96% of the total area of groves, in contrast with 88% in 1933).Apart from cereals, pulses and vines disappear, these changes indicate a deeper and fundamental change in Lesvos’ agriculture, a gradual halt in practices that combined different land uses, agriculture and animal husbandry (fallow, seasonal movements, mixed farming). On the other hand, sheep were tripled: from 70,000 in 1911 to 267,000 in 2001along with grazing lands. Nowadays, lots of olive fields are ‘mildly abandoned meaning that only when production is satisfactory are the olives collected and little or non other cultivation management is practised