Assessment Of Coastal Sustainable Development In Fujian And Taiwan Based On The Coastal Development Index

Coastai area is a coupiea numan-ocean system.i ne coastal environment is sensitive and vulnerable to anthropogenic threats.However,since the development of global marine industry,numerous human activities place heavy pressure on coastal ecosystems,making coastal area become one of the three most vulnerable areas in the world.Managing these pressures is a substantial challenge for decision-makers who have to take into account the trade-offs between environmental conservation and economic growth.To meet this challenge,targeted scientifically-based strategies and planning are required to manage coastal environments in an ecologically sustainable manner.Therefore,rigorous assessment of the changes in coastal development over time is a key step forjudging whether coastal management strategies and policies are sustainable or whether they need to be modified and improved.Based on this idea,we propose a new methodological framework-the Coastal Development Index(CDI)to directly assess how the sustainability of coastal developments is changing over time in this thesis.The CDI is composed of two indicators.One indicator is ecological and environmental indicators(EEI),the other indicator is social and economic indicators(SEI),each indicator consists of three sub-indicators.EEI consists of coastal protection(CP),clean waters(CW),and species protection(SP),SEI composed of food provision(FP),coastal livelihoods and economies(CLE),and tourism and recreation(TR).The six sub-indicators represent key aspects of coastal development and levels of exploitation of natural resources.CDI is a potentially powerful tool for assessing the changes in the sustainability of coastal development over time.It offers several advantages over other conceptual frameworks(e.g.,PSR,DPSIR).First,the use of CDI can help quantify whether coastal development is sustainable by directly employing mathematical formulas to calculate indicators(including sub-indicators and their components).The approach avoids problems associated with normalizing indicators characterized by different units and magnitudes of change that compromise other conventional conceptual frameworks.Second,the values of sub-indicators are able to clearly show the changes in the key aspects of the coastal zone over time.Therefore,if a coastal zone was subject to unsustainable development,the CDI can help identify the underlying reasons for this outcome.Furthermore,because it is unnecessary to both distinguish the cause-effect relationships between indicators(including sub-indicators and their components)and to categorize them,the CDI can be easily used not only by the professional experts but also by lay citizens who have some general knowledge of the topic.We demonstrate the value of CDI with two detailed case studies of Fujian Province and Taiwan province in China,2000-2013.Fujian and Taiwan are two typical coastal provinces in China.Based on the five-advantages,the assessment of the sustainable development of the coastal area of those two provinces can extend the Chinese mainland research on Taiwan to the coastal areas.Moreover,it provides an important theoretical basis to achieve the common development in the coastal area between Fujian and Taiwan.The results show the CDI of Fujian coast linearly decreased from 2000 to 2013 indicating that the Fuj ian coastal area has experienced unsustainable development during that time.The EEI decreased whereas the scores of SEI increased during that time indicating that economic growth has been at the expense of environmental values on Fujian coast.Analyzing the scores of sub-indicators revealed a serious loss of Fujian coastal habitats,a loss of natural coastline,insufficient marine protected areas,and very poor water quality.The use of the CDI makes it clear that the integration of economic growth and social development with environmental conservation is needed to improve the sustainability of Fujian coastal zone.The results show the CDI of Taiwan rises at first and then drops gradually,indicating that the sustainability of coastal development in Taiwan gradually declines from 2000 to 2013.The EEI and SEI Changes in wave-like movements illustrate the economic growth and environmental protection in Taiwan experienced an incoordination ? coordination ? incoordination process.The sustainable development of Taiwan coastal area should focus both on acceleration the economic growth and preservation the environmental protection achievement.In addition,the CDI also reveals Taiwan has experienced a problem of coastal biodiversity decreasement,owing to the coastal manage departments mainly focusing on quantity while ignoring the quality of the construction of marine protected areas.Finally,we compare the CDI results of the coastal areas in Fujian and Taiwan provinces.The CDI of Taiwan is significantly higher than Fujian,which indicating the ecological sustainability of Taiwan's coast is better than Fujian Province during 2000-2013.Comparing the EEI and SEI of those two provinces,the situation of ecology and environment of Taiwan Province is better than Fujian Province while socio-economic development of Fujian Province is better than Taiwan Province.Analyzing the results of the comparison between Fujian province and Taiwan province reveal the reasons for the sustainable development differences in both coastal areas,which can be concluded from three aspects.First,from the economic aspect,one reason for the sustainable development differences mainly results from the different development stage of the marine economy.Second,from the environmental management aspect,the reason for the sustainable development differences is the speed difference in the coastal management regulation development.Third,from the social aspect,the reason for the sustainable development differences is coming from the differences in environmental protection movement and the political environment of the two provinces.In addition,several recommendations are proposed to improve the situation of sustainable development in both Fujian and Taiwan coastal areas to achieve complementary advantages and common development.