Challenges Ahead of Integrated Coastal Zone Management in Environmentally Sensitive Islands: A Case Study

Abstract

Small islands around the world encounter special challenges due to vulnerability to acute climates, human-induced activities and pollution. The challenges even become more intricate where the island is located in environmentally sensitive regions. In order to address the problems in coastal areas, Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) whose concept was born in 1992 during the Earth Summit of Rio de Janeiro, has been recommended by United Nations. This paper focuses on challenges ahead of ICZM in environmentally sensitive islands through Interaction-Stakeholder and Option Matrices. Kish Island is a beautiful small island located in Persian Gulf. With regard to environmental sensitivities and susceptibilities of the island, its ICZM plan requires special attention. The method utilized in this article combines the perception of stakeholders’ need and coastal issues with the effects of management interventions. The method developed for Kish’s ICZM plan can provide comprehensible tools for decision makers in order to find the sources of conflicts and problems. According to the results, most of the interactions belong to “coastal environment” and “tourism” and also many groups of primary stakeholders are involved by many changes. The results of Option Matrix imply that “environmental legislation and mandatory EIA for any project and any discharge” and also “allocation of some regions to national park” interact with various components of the matrix and many primary stakeholders engage. Finally, some of the obstacles are scrutinized in this study such as: environmental legislation, lack of local environmental standards, lack of enough incentive among primary and secondary stakeholders, etc.