A Wadden Sea Forum will be established to develop scenarios for sustainable development and strategies for their implementation. These strategies include policies for resource use, regulation of activities in the coastal zone, promotion of sustainable regional development, recommendations for the joint implementation of EU legislation and the identification of projects to implement sustainable development into spatial planning. Stakeholders include national, regional and local authorities, different interest groups and advisory boards and experts.

The Wadden Sea is an area off the coasts of Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands. The respective national governments have coordinated their activities including management, monitoring, research and political matters since 1978 to ensure that the sea is protected. The aim of the "Trilateral Wadden Sea Forum" (WSF) is the development of new and improved socio-economic perspectives in the Wadden Sea region. These should be compatible with national and international standards of environmental protection for the Wadden Sea ecosystem, landscape and cultural heritage as laid down in the joint trilateral Wadden Sea Plan, The Bird, Habitat and Water Framework Directives and in accordance with the vision, aims and strategies of the NorVision document.

Expected Outcomes

The four main outcomes of the WSF are envisaged to be: sustainable development scenarios and strategies for their implementation, including integrated spatial and sectoral planning of the Wadden Sea and coastal zones. Strategies, policies and management arrangements for resource use, regulation of activities in coastal zones, recommendations for joint implementation of EU legislation, strategies and policies for cross-sectoral and integrated management and projects for implementing sustainable development scenarios into spatial planning, policies and management by governmental and non-governmental stakeholders. Cooperation agreements between stakeholders and a structure for an interregional communication and cooperation network serving to support and promote future sustainable development activities will also be developed. This should lead to the creation of a common knowledge basis which will enable the promotion and exchange of innovative sustainable development activities and strategies.

Activities

The WSF approach is in the form of four separate activities, namely, Plenary Forum Meetings, Thematic Groups, External Studies, and Public Participation and Regional Anchoring. The Plenary Forum meetings are the main instrument of the WSF project. In these meetings the representative stakeholders from government and NGOs will discuss and adopt sustainable development scenarios and strategies for implementation and elaboration. A minimum of 6 plenary meetings are envisaged with a maximum of forty-one participants per meeting. To facilitate the WSF, a secretariat will be established as a joint venture between Wadden Sea Co-operation (representing the regional Wadden Sea authorities) and the Common Wadden Sea Secretariat, and assisted by international NGOs. The Thematic Groups will primarily prepare background material and proposals for the Plenary Forum and will focus on agriculture, fisheries, industry, energy and policy, management and legal aspects. External studies will produce realistic scenarios from up-to-date facts on issues such as the economic situation of different sectors, prognoses for the near future and demographic development. These external scenarios will focus on four areas; an overall inventory of socio-economic facts, a socio-economic perspectives analysis, an investigative capitalization of natural values and a comparative analysis of policy and management. Finally Public Participation and Regional Anchoring will increase public access and understanding of the project with meetings of the WSF open to the press and public. Regional workshops and a conference will be organized in which the general public will be invited to provide input to the process of developing scenarios. Additional meetings and information campaigns will be held with all material available on the WSF website.

Reported Outcomes

The Wadden Sea Forum held its sixth meeting in Leeuwarden (NL) in February 2005, when the project final report "Breaking the Ice" was officially adopted. An additional meeting was organised in September 2005. During the seventh meeting in Hamburg the WSF Action Plan was approved. All the documents are now available for downloading from the project website (www.waddensea-secretariat.org). In the first half of 2005 the project was also presented at several conferences and seminars, e.g. at a conference organised in Ameland (NL) by the Wadden Sea island cooperation "Euregio" or at "People at the Sea" conference held in Amsterdam.