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Environment
and development in coastal regions and in small islands |
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Environment
and development in coastal regions and in small islands |
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work in progress 2
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background
1. Focusing on intersectoral modalities, a platform for ‘Environment and Development in Coastal Regions and in Small Islands’ (CSI) was established by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1996. The CSI initiative seeks to achieve environmentally sound, socially equitable, culturally respectful and economically viable development in coastal regions and in small islands.
2. Such an initiative is particularly appropriate when viewed against the background of UNESCO’s constitution (1945), part of which is reproduced below:
‘That a peace based exclusively upon the political and economic arrangements of governments would not be a peace which could secure the unanimous, lasting and sincere support of the peoples of the world, and that the peace must therefore be founded, if it is not to fail, upon the intellectual and moral solidarity of mankind.
For these reasons, the States Parties to this Constitution …… are agreed and determined to develop and to increase the means of communication between their peoples and to employ these means for the purposes of mutual understanding and a truer and more perfect knowledge of each other’s lives’.
3. This mandate, created in response to the causes and consequences of World War II, has stood the test of time and is especially relevant for UNESCO’s action in the twenty first century (Interim Report of the Task Force on UNESCO in the 21st Century):
‘The Organization’s specific mission …… should continue to be the construction of the defences of peace in the minds of men, contributing to peace and security by promoting collaboration between peoples through education, science, culture and communication’.
4. The CSI initiative seeks to contribute to meaningful exchanges between the peoples of the world, using all available means of communication, in order to develop knowledge and understanding about coastal areas and to achieve sustainable living in coastal regions and in small islands.
1.2 Programme of Action 1996 - 2007
5. Recognising the diversity of problems facing societies in small islands and coastal regions, including population growth and unsustainable consumption patterns, poverty and extreme poverty, the CSI platform has embarked on an ambitious agenda which seeks to involve all societal domains.
6. Figure 1 shows the activities to date and the draft forward-planning for the period 1996-2007. Since 1996, some 21 pilot project activities have been initiated, co-sponsored and, in a few cases, inherited, they now involve some 60 countries. These field-based projects provide frameworks for collaborative action and represent hands-on, tangible activities against which generic ideas relating to sustainable coastal living can be formulated, tested and evaluated. To support the pilot projects, two university chairs have been formally established and several others initiated, as well as a university twinning network, to develop local capacity and awareness concerning sustainable coastal and small island development. (For a complete list of the pilot projects and university chairs see Appendix I).
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7. During and after a workshop ‘Towards Wise Coastal Development Practice’ held in Paris in 1998 (UNESCO, 2000), characteristics for describing wise practices were formulated.
8. In April 1999, a global web-based discussion forum on ‘Wise Coastal Practices for Sustainable Human Development’ (username: csi; password: wise; hereafter referred to as the Forum) was initiated. Its aim was firstly to determine the relevance and usefulness of the wise practice characteristics, and secondly to discuss the findings within a wider context and with expanded participation.
9. The results of the Forum (username: csi; password: wise) will be used to evaluate and refocus the pilot projects and university chairs. These activities are the foundation of the CSI initiative, they represent practical hands-on, living laboratories, and as such can provide benchmarks of wise practice.
10. In conjunction with refocusing the pilot project and chair activities, the Forum (username: csi; password: wise) will be directed to further refine wise practice ideas and to test their wider application at national, regional and global levels.
11. Through continuing and prioritised interaction from the local to the regional to the global levels and vice versa, wise practices could thus be implemented through carefully developed and fully intersectoral pilot projects and university chairs/twinning. These, together with other non-CSI activities and the Forum (username: csi; password: wise), form a testing ground for local, national, regional and global wise-practice application. Thus wise practices could not only benefit from other relevant activities, initiatives and programmes, but could in turn be of benefit to corresponding efforts.
12. A comprehensive set of wise practices will be elaborated to address priority concerns: small island issues1, coastal urbanisation, loss of biodiversity, the impact of tourism, demise of local and indigenous knowledge and management practice, coastal erosion, freshwater security, and the decline of fish stocks and other living resources.
13. A set of guidelines or principles will be developed to ensure effective interaction between local and global levels, hamonisation between top-down and bottom-up approaches, integration among institutional domains and complementarity among societal sectors.
14. These steps will contribute to the development of an ethical code of practice, based on tested wise practices and supporting guidelines or principles, to resolve conflicts over coastal resources and values as well as to promote sustainable living in coastal regions and in small islands.
[1] Six priority problem areas identified in the ‘Barbados Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States’ are: (a) Climate change – adapting to climate change and rising sea levels, which could submerge some low-lying island nations; (b) Natural and environmental disasters and climate variability – improving preparedness for and recovery from natural and environmental disasters; (c) Freshwater resources – preventing worsening shortages of freshwater as demand grows; (d) Coastal and marine resources – protecting coastal ecosystems and coral reefs from pollution and over-fishing; (e) Energy – developing solar and renewable energy to lessen dependence on expensive imported oil; (f) Tourism – managing tourism growth to protect the environment and cultural integrity.
1.3 Wise Coastal Practices for Sustainable Human Development Forum
15. The Forum (username: csi; password: wise) commenced in April, 1999, with participants from CSI projects and non-CSI activities, who were invited to submit example wise practices (EWPs) to the Forum and to analyse these examples using a list of wise practice characteristics (see Appendix II) that had been formulated during the 1998 workshop and subsequent electronic discussions. Participants were also invited to react and respond to the contributions posted on the Forum. Towards the end of 1999, the Forum was reorganised, the number of participants was expanded to include a wide range of institutions, agencies, projects and individuals, and the focus shifted towards a more general discussion of wise practices. At the beginning of 2000, because of the increased numbers of participants and postings, direct posting to the Forum was replaced by moderated posting, and this was limited to one posting per week. By 30th September 2000, some 52 EWPs had been submitted to the Forum and 118 responses/reactions (see Appendix III for a list of contributions ordered by Forum Uniform Resource Locator (URL) number, and Appendix IV for a list of contributions ordered alphabetically by author). During the 18 months in which the Forum has been operating, it has undergone one major reorganisation and the number of connected people worldwide now stands at more than 1,800.
16. The Forum (username: csi; password: wise) is totally moderated by four persons bringing skills in management, communication, computing and integrated coastal management (ICM). All potential contributions are carefully assessed by at least two moderators for content, relevance and language and then, if suitable, posted in such an order as to maintain the diversity of the Forum while also pursuing certain discussion threads and issues. Contributions from certain French, Spanish and Malay speaking parts of the world are also posted in those languages. Some especially significant contributions are also posted in more than one language.
17. After the Forum’s (username: csi; password: wise) first six months of operation a ‘Work in Progress Paper’ (WIP 1) was prepared and widely circulated. Now, after more than 18 months operation it is considered timely to prepare this second, more substantial ‘Work in Progress Paper’ (WIP 2), which also discusses the future direction of activities on the CSI platform for the period 2001-2007.
18. WIP 2 is arranged in four chapters. Following this Introduction, Chapter 2 describes the nature of the Forum contributions, the major themes and geographical distribution. Chapter 3 analyses the characteristics used to define wise practices and their use in the example wise practices. Finally, in Chapter 4, ways forward for the Forum, as well as for activities on the CSI platform through to 2007, are discussed.
19. WIP 2 seeks to provide an overview and analysis of the findings of the Forum (username: csi; password: wise), and directions for moving forward. This document was drafted in May 2000 and translated into French, after which it underwent extensive review by 30 individuals (see list on title page). This present version of WIP 2, prepared in November 2000, incorporates the feedback received and reflects contributions to the end of September 2000. However, the Forum is ongoing. Throughout this document, specific contributions are referred to by their Forum URL number.
20. Forum (username: csi; password: wise) participants are asked to examine and comment on this revised document so that as far as possible it can reflect the views of the Forum and thereby assist in the overall goal of strengthening the follow-up work towards sustainable living in coastal regions and in small islands in the years and decades ahead.
21. Summaries of the document were posted on the Forum (username: csi; password: wise) at the end of 2000, with hotlinks to the full versions in English, French and Spanish on the CSI website. Paper copies will also be available on request to the Moderator (moderator@csiwisepractices.org).
