Coastal Partnerships

The Solent Forum is just one of numerous coastal partnerships around the coast of the UK. Coastal partnerships bring together an area's coastal community to address issues of concern, share best practice and facilitate communication. Most partnerships have a small staff that are based in the offices of one of the organisations with a coastal remit, they organise regular events and meetings and run partnership projects.

The boundary of each partnership is set by a distinct geographical unit rather than man-made administrative boundaries. This enables the section of coast in question to be managed in a coherent comprehensive way. For example, the Solent Forum encompasses the East and West Solent and all its constituent estuaries, of both the mainland and the Isle of Wight’s coast.

Role of Partnerships

Since the early 1990's over 50 Coastal Partnerships have been set up around the UK coast. These partnership initiatives have evolved from a 'bottom-up' approach, with people involved from local communities, clubs and user groups to local authorities, statutory agencies, industries, water companies, port & harbour authorities and NGOs.

There is huge diversity in the approach of Coastal Partnerships, but they all have similar unique selling points which make them well placed to deliver Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM):

Impartiality and a proven role in conflict resolution and consensus building;
The ability to work across sectors and between all levels of decision-making;
Raising awareness of issues and a mechanism for community engagement;
Horizon scanning to inform organisations of coastal issues;
Attracting project funding and initiating collaborative ventures;
Providing a gateway service and 'one-stop-shop' for information and contacts;
Filling gaps where there are no sectoral responsibilities and mobilising voluntary support and involvement;
Providing a (bottom-up) conduit to regional and national government;

Partnership approaches have been tried and tested in many fields and are becoming increasingly popular. Coastal partnerships specialise in providing services to help organisations deliver ICZM. There are other organisations and some partnership initiatives that deliver ICZM (e.g. AONBs with sections of coast, the European Marine Sites and Shoreline Management Groups) but they don't offer the same core services which the existing voluntary Coastal Partnerships provide.

Achievements

Coastal Partnerships have existed for 10-15 years around the UK coast on ad-hoc funding contributions from local partners. On this basis they have provided significant value for money, levering in support, in-kind benefits and the goodwill of many partners. Many of the benefits are intangible; improved communication, understanding and awareness of coastal issues; access to information and contacts; new collaboration opportunities and research, advising on policy and planning, mobilising community involvement in decision-making; and providing a neutral platform for debate.

Coastal Partnerships are at the forefront of providing mechanisms to help deliver ICZM. The experience and value of coastal partnerships should be harnessed as we move towards a Marine Bill. Indeed, Defra's national stocktake on ICZM demonstrated that coastal fora/partnerships, such as the Solent Forum, were an effective way of moving ICZM forward at local level.