Australia, Climate Change and the Sea Change

Abstract

Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) has been embraced world wide in the management of the multiple impacts along our coastlines. Australia has been no exception, having a long history of development of coastal zone management from the Resource Assessment Commission’s inquiry into the coast in the early 1990s, to the establishment of the National Coastal Zone Management Framework. However, with the sea change phenomenon and threats to the coast as a result of sea level rise, there is a need to assess the suitability of conventional criteria for ICZM. This paper, using case studies of Victoria and Tasmania, Australia, considers whether the challenges of coastal migration and climate change merit new approaches for ICZM. We argue that building adaptive capacity and adaptive learning strategies must be incorporated as further and discrete criteria within coastal zone planning instruments.