Planetary discussion

ICAM workshop - planetary discussion

Ms. Bui Anh Dao, DARD Ca Mau: What are the difficulties that you have encountered during deployment of co-management in Soc Trang, and what are your solutions to these problem?

Dr. Klaus Schmitt: The most important first step and the biggest obstacle to overcome is to get acceptance. Co-management, the way we are implemented is a new concept in mangrove management. So it is very important to convince, first of all, political decision-makers. It is certainly a viable alternative to current forms of management. Once we had their support, we had to convince local people about the usefulness of co-management and try to convince them that they should try and join the pilot activities.

The first step in co-management process is consultation. This is a fundamental step and important step: consulting the people, convincing them that it is a useful thing to try and implement.

We tried a number of different things at the same time. We started with a workshop in which we introduced about the concept so that people could hear about it, having a rough idea of what it means. Then we organized a study tour to working co-management concept in Cambodia in the mangroves. We followed up with another workshop and meetings and so… Slowly step by step, we convinced the political decision-makers. And at the local level, we had many meetings and long discussions; basically we were trying to approach them, informing people and convincing them about the usefulness of co-management.

Mr. Thieu Quang Duc: I would like to have 2 issues to discuss with Dr. Schmitt. The coastal values of Soc Trang are 3 points: the mangrove forests, the wetlands and the estuaries.  According to you, how is the process of building and implementing ICAM in Soc Trang, as well as strategy planning?

The second question, in the action plan, I saw 2 big plans which are spatial planning and policy mechanism/institution. According to you, how these two are implementing in Soc Trang? Or do we have any other plans?

Dr. Klaus Schmitt: Basically, by involving all relevant stakeholders, the technical departments which are in charge but also the local people who are affected by these decisions. Planning is integrated in one plan, we don’t have various small sector plans, but all the sector plans become parts of one plan. There will be a strategic development planning for the coastal zone in Soc Trang which encompasses the mangrove, the wetland and the estuary areas, and all these various sectors with responsible parts of it included in just one plan. Then the action plan for the future is provided. And guarantee planning is strategic, because it involves all relevant stakeholders and all relevant sectors.

Mr. Tran Vinh Phuc, DARD Tra Vinh:  Question to Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi, a month ago, I attended a workshop on co-management organized by MARD in Ha Long. I think co-management is just a small part of ICAM. In the coming future, MARD intends to bring this term into Fishery Law modification. ICAM, according to MONRE is about integration and environmental protection, resource management, including fishery resources. In order to have agreement on management between MONRE and MARD to effectively implement co-management and ICAM, is there a consultation to bring about a common strategy?

Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi: It can be said that co-management is an initiative measure. In Vietnam, DANIDA inspired about co-management 15 years ago. However, due to different understanding, the government did not support much of early applying co-management. At that time, some scientists have received the DANIDA concept of co-management and think that the state has to share half of the rights to people (50:50). The state thought it was impossible as our public awareness was low and people were poor.

However, recently, we’ve understood more correctly about co-management and have had some pilot projects. The nature of co-management is that government and people are working together and share benefits. It does not mean that the state and people will share every action 50:50 but sometimes it would be 30:70 or 70:30. The point is the state and people working together and sharing benefits together.

The legalization of co-management in Fishery Law is good. It would not be overlapped with MONRE as it is just a mechanism and principle. We can look at co-management as a supporting tool for integrated management, especially in attracting public participation and building consensus for common goals, for solving specific issues at local areas.

Dr. Le Thi Thu Huong, UNU: I have a question to you all, Vietnamese government has a plan to build protective dykes to the coastal areas. I would like to know your opinions about this issue, because Germany, Australia and the Netherlands you have the financial and technical resources while we lack of these and we would like to build.  How do you think? How would it help? And how about bringing and linking to other protection measures such as mangrove forests?

Dr. Klaus Schmitt: For protection measures in the coastal zone, firstly we need site-specific interventions. In certain sites, we can make it in a way which is very cheap. So we don’t need at the same time expensive measures in every place. It is possible to put in place protection measures which do not cost much money. In Soc Trang, we use bamboo for wavebreaking barrier and hopefully very soon, sometime next year, we will have first results on that.

Dr. Stefan Groenewold: I just would like to add, the most important thing for protected area is to create ownership for it, then to connect somehow income and livelihood.  In my opinion, external financing should not be the mean, because it is not sustainable, it can help of course, at the beginning for organizing awareness campaign.

Prof. Tim Smith: General comment would be any form of manipulation of natural system often requires on-going manipulation which can create path dependency. It is important to understand and figure out what dependent issues into the decision, what sort of manipulation to make into natural system.

Mr. Thorsten Albers: There are tools to find the best solutions for emergence protection. We must base on cost – benefit analysis then it would be easy to find a good and also cost effective solution. It is always my key message, you have to go to nature, you have to see what happen, and you have to understand its purposes… so that you can find solutions which may not be very technical or very expensive. We will be able to find solution which is close to nature, not against nature, and then again it would be cheap and effective.

Dr. Andrea, GIZ Philippines: Dr. Hoi presented early this morning several objectives, could you possible prioritize one that needs the most immediate attention?

Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi: The common goat of ICAM strategy is towards sustainable development of coastal areas, intra-generationally (among social welfare, economic and environment) and inter-generationally.

Coastal management issues priorities are varied with areas, dependent on their geographical, environmental, economic, social and political supporting characteristics.

Mr. Hoang, GIZ Bac Lieu: Question to Dr. Hoi, in the morning presentation of Mr. Nguyen Duc Hoang, I like very much the idea of absolute no-take zone in Philippines. In Vietnam, we don’t have yet any such “no-take” zone. As the one who participate in building the framework for ICAM in Vietnam, what do you think about strictly enforcement and implementation of fishery resource protection law?

Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi: Lesson learned from Philippines showed that they are very successful with “no-take” zone. In principle, when establishing some marine protected areas, we also mark “no-take” zone or core zone. For example, in Nha Trang bay, Hon Mun is the core zone, no fishing is allowed there. However, our problem is in enforcement (implementation and monitoring).

Another point that makes enforcement strong in Philippines is the role of public, local people. The nature, structure, and public awareness of the coastal communities in Vietnam are very different with those in Philippines. Our people are not very active, passive and dependent on the state.

Beside land-use planning for the land, in the coming future, VASI will bring into law sea-use planning. Currently, VASI is keeping 20 billion VND for sea use planning (master plan) in the whole nation. And in functionally zoning, “no-take zones” will also be showed up there.

Mr. Nguyen Van Minh KfW: Question to Dr. Hoi, currently we have some projects investing in Kien Giang and Ca Mau to build sea dykes and rehabilitation of mangrove forests. In my observation, The Mekong Delta is a very important region in the strategy that you have mentioned this morning. In each province, there are projects sponsored by many different donors which are not integrated for a whole region. What do you think if we should have a measure to coordinate all these? Should we have a kind of structure or body to coordinate these? How to coordinate all these projects so that they can bring bigger impact to the whole Mekong Delta?

Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi: Our policy is that we need integration. If a project is on provincial level, provincial people committee should be the focus point of integration and there is no need for any new body/institution. The focus point in People Committee will ensure no overlapping and optimize the investment. President of the province should make coordinating for foreign projects/investment. Moreover, provinces should not wait for foreign aids but should be active in financing themselves on ICAM projects.

Dr. Nguyen Duc Kien: ICAM is not new as the world has already worked with it for more than 20 years. However, there are issues in Australia as we have heard, or in Philippines. Problems in Vietnam, as you also know, for example, the problem of ownership of mangrove forests in coastal areas. In my opinion, the biggest achievement from this workshop is the agreement on the concept that ICAM need to link with social issues, ensuring social equity in the project areas. We have to take human as the central factor to reduce human impacts on environment and at the same time let people be more responsible.

Secondly, in ICAM, there are no relative borders among provinces because of the continuity of the coastline and current/flow. Therefore, I agree with Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi, the next task is building the legal framework for ICAM. The technical support from experts and international organizations are the first step for us to figure out how future steps should be. We need to take the advantage of this support to establish a legal framework. (For example, co-management is a good model in Au Tho B but we have legal problem with up-scaling). So we should find what is not relevant/right in our legal system to modify, learning from international experiences. In the future, when there is no more international aid, the ultimate goal is that local people can sustain themselves and the projects. We cannot rely always to international aids and central budget.  We need a master plan, and from that sectors and investors can help.

Thirdly, responsibilities of leaders in People Committee are to coordinate, allocate, distribute the projects.

Finally, we need public awareness raising so that people can understand their rights and responsibilities in implementing ICAM. People would have social responsibilities, self regulated, in an interconnected society.

Mr. Patrick Schwab, GIZ Philippines: Vulnerability assessment is really one vital tool that we could consider in climate change context. We have many vulnerability assessment tools (biological one, geographical one, demography factor…). Is there any strategy for establish coastal area management in general and also for Vietnam where people know how high their vulnerability is so that they can adapt and give management to climate change impact? 

Dr. Stefan Groenewold: Try to catch local knowledge and use it for vulnerability assessment, it should be definitely part of the ICAM planning.

Prof. Tim Smith: There is a whole range of methods/approaches/disciplines for assessing vulnerability. One of the things we often forget is that vulnerability assessment really approached by climate change adaptation from a risk perspective. So there are overseen ranges of opportunities that climate change as protective as well. We must be mindful, not just maintain everything on status quo in dealing with coastal challenges, but also be open for new opportunities that may arise.

Mr. Tran Minh Trung, DARD Kien Giang: Co-management in Au Tho B. Each province has its own characteristic and we cannot apply Au Tho B model in Kien Giang. In Au Tho B mostly are ethnic and poor people while in Kien Giang people are of middle income to well-off. Secondly, there is different ownership. In Soc Trang, coastal forests are managed by Kiem Lam (the state) and co-management in Au Tho B while in Kien Giang, forests and forest lands are directly given to local households (through contracting), on average, 1.5 - 2 ha per household. I think people have more responsibility as they build their own houses in the land; they produce, protect, manage forests and forest lands. I think this is more effective. Each province has its own characteristics and we cannot apply single/same model to all. When we apply the model of giving land to households in Kien Giang, people’s lives are good now.

About ICAM, I think the most important thing is to build a legal framework. When we have legal framework, functional departments then can consult to provincial people’s committee on policy solution and planning.

I wonder very much whether the co-management still continue in Soc Trang after project end. People there are very poor, income from the mudflat is not high. 

Dr. Klaus Schmitt: On the sustainability of co-management in Au Tho B, we put in place a mechanism to ensure its sustainability, PES, payment for ecosystem services. The cost of co-management operation in Au Tho B is covered by profits from commercial farming of the clams on the mudflat in front of the sandbank in Au Tho B. All member of the co-management group are members of the clam cooperative, which give them another income as well.