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ICM in practice

There are three very broad approaches towards ICM.

They are:

An integrated institutional mechanism, where one organization is responsible for most, or all, aspects of coastal management. For example, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, in Australia, is responsible for a wide range of tasks including zoning activities on the Reef, formulating a plan for the area, running education programmes, and developing, interpreting and applying comprehensive research and monitoring programmes covering not just the Reef but the water catchments on the mainland that drain into the area. But it is limited in some ways. It does not manage fisheries on the Reef, and has no executive authority for managing the way land is used on the mainland - though it can influence it.

An institutionally co-ordinated approach, where one institution co-ordinates the plans and work of others. For example in the Chesapeake Bay Programme, in the United States, the federal Environmental Protection Agency co-ordinates other federal and state bodies. The programme aims at reducing pollution of the Bay by nutrients, and at recovering the abundance, diversity and productivity of its natural resources.

Institutional co-ordination achieved through consultation within a legislative framework. In Zanzibar, for example, the Ministry of Lands and the Environment has taken the lead in developing a holistic strategy for protecting the coasts. This is based on working closely with other ministries on partnerships with local communities and provides the framework for managing natural resources and other activities. Some Mediterranean countries, developed and developing, are also applying this type of ICM at a national, provincial or local level.