Some definitions of Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM)

Inter-governmental organisations

"The overall objective of an integrated management programme, like ICZM, is to provide for the best long-term and sustainable use of coastal natural resources and for perpetual mantenance of the most natural environment"

                                                                  FAO, Clark 1992

"The most appropriate process to address current and long-term coastal management issues, including habitat loss, degradation of water quality, changes in hydrological cycles, depletion of coastal resources, and adaptation to sea level rise and other impacts of global climate change"

                                   Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 1994

"An adaptative process of resource management for environmentally sustainable development in coastal areas. It is not a substitute for sectoral planning, but focuses on the linkages between sectoral activities to achieve more comprehensive goals"

                                                                        UNEP 1995

"ICZM is a strategy for an integrated approach to planning and management, in which all policies, sectors and, to the highest possible extent, individual instests are properly taken into account, with the proper consideration given to the full range of temporal and spatial scales, and involving stakeholders in a participative way. It demands good communication among governing authorities (local, regional and national), and promises to address all three dimensions of sustainability: socio/cultural, economic and environmental. It thus provides management instruments that are not per se included or foreseen in the different policies and directives in such comprehensiveness."

                           Rupprecht Consult & International Ocean Institute 2006

Science

"A dynamic process in which a coordinated strategy is developed and implemented for the allocation of environmental, socio-cultural, and institutional resources to achieve the conservation and sustainable multiple use of the coastal zone"

                                Coastal Area Management and Planning Network 1989

"...to allow multi-sectoral development to progress with the fewest unintended setbacks and the least possible imposition of long-run social costs"

                                                   Scura, Chua, Pido and Paw 1992

"A continuous and dynamic process that recognises the distinctive character of the coastal zone -itself a valuable resource- for current and future generations"

                                                                  Cicin-Sain 1993

"The integration of environmental protection goals into economic and technical decision-making process"

                                                    Kenchington and Crawford 1993

"A holistic approach, in which the ecosystem as a whole (all the biotic and abiotic components) and all kinds of coastal use, as well as all use -use and use- ecosystem relationships are included"

                                                                     Vallega 1993

"The integrated planning and management of coastal resources and environments in a manner that is based on the physical socio-economic, and political interconnections both within and among the dynamic coastal systems, which when aggregated together, define a coastal zone"

                                                                    Sorensen 1997

"Integrated coastal management is a process that recognises the distinctive character of the coastal area -itself a valuable resources- and the importance of conserving it for current and future generations"

                                                       Cicin-Sain and Knecht 1998

"ICZM aims to preserve coastal resources, their ecological functioning and ultimately their values by applying adequate land use planning within a social, institutional and economic context"

                                                              Skourtos et al 2005