THE ANTALYA DECLARATION OF COASTAL SEAS

ON This declaration is issued by more than 300 delegates from 50 countries who participated in the joint international conference, MEDCOAST '99/EMECS '99. Antalya, Turkey. The conference represents the convergence of two perspectives for improving environmental management of coastal seas:
MEDCOAST, a regional initiative for the Mediterranean Sea and Black Seas, and EMECS , a global forum for policy makers, scientists, engineers, educators, and members of non-governmental organizations that is coordinated by the International EMECS Center, Located in Kobe on the shore of the Seto Inland Sea of Japan. The unifying conference theme was, 'Land-Ocean Interactions: Managing Coastal Systems,

We begin our conclusions with an allegory:

As the MEDCOAST and EMECS initiatives approach the end of their first decade, we recognize that we have crossed a familiar coastal landscape. We stand now overlooking a coast where a vast new sea sparkles in the sun. Today we see only a little of this new coastal sea, but future generations will surely walk its shore, sail its waters and harvest its resources.

The familiar landscape Is still well marked by traditional boundaries. There are the political lines of local juridistictions, states and nations, Researchers continue to define ecological differences between river, bay, Land and sea, Each, of us has become comfortable in our individual roles as biologist or hydrologist, engineer or manager, policy maker or citizen.

The new sea before us appears to be boundless, Automated monitoring techniques are generating large amounts of information, much of it in real time, that shows how the sea changes from day to day, month to month, year to year in response to changing land use and global climate trends. Satellite images are revealing how local coastal problems relate to regional sea processes and to those of the world ocean. Electronic communication is making this wealth of new information available to everyone at the same time: researcher, political official and concerned citizen alike, It is truly a seascape without familiar boundaries; its navigator is technology; day and night no longer dictate how clear we view its waters.

The participants in MEDCOAST '99/ EMECS '99 invite our regional and global colleagues to join us in the task of building the best vessels possible to help our children and their children navigate this new seascape and sustain the full potential of Its resources. We will work together across traditional boundaries and assume personal responsibility for achieving our goal, irrespective of our nation, our discipline, or our role in life. We will meld old values into a new ethic that takes into account the true contribution a clean and healthy coastal environment makes to our social and economic well being. Finally, we will use new information technology to provide to those who teach our young people the products of our research, the fruits of our wisdom and the benefits of our experiences.

We recommend that the following actions be undertaken by those who conduct national, regional and internatlonal environmental programs, as well as by individual policy makers, engineers, scientlsts, and concerned citizens:

1. Make every effort both to encourage and to improve communication between researchers and policy makers to ensure that environmental management of coastal seas is based on sound scientlfic information obtalned by using the best technology available.

2. Pursue an interdisciplinary approach that includes not only the natural sciences and engineering but also economics, Iaw, ethics, and aesthetics as the bases of more effective environmental policy, using coastal seas as excellent models for applying new remote sensing technologies and dealing with the complex interaction between land, water, and human endeavors.

3. Give paramount importance to active and informed public participation making every effort to inform citizens, directly and by working more closely with non-governmental organizations, about what all people can do to improve their coastal waters and sustain their irreplaceable resources.

4. Develop a new kind of environmental education for our young people, one that directly involves their schoo]s and available Internet resources, enabling the use of coastal seas data and information to enrich curricula not only in science and mathematics but also in history, literature, and the arts.

5. Recognize the urgency of restoring and conserving coastal environments by turning policy into practice, realizing theory by taking action, sharing our knowledge and experiences instead of keeping them to ourselves, and eliminating delay by moving now.

6. Strengthen cooperation at local, national, and regional levels, recognizing that land-sea interactions transcend political boundaries and are part of the global ecosystem which we all share.

We encourage governments and organizations that fund environmental programs to join this . commitment by providing urgently needed resources, paying special attention to the protection and restoration of coastal seas in developing regions. We recommend that such support be provided to help all nations, including those of the Black Sea area, to become full participants In regionaland global initiatives for improved environmental management of the world's coastal seas.

Let us begin now!

Antalya, Turkey
12th November 1999