Document Actions
Bataan Province Shares Best Practices in ICM implementation to the Ilocos Region
Bataan, Philippines - The Philippines has over three decades of experience in implementing coastal management projects and programs. The Coastal Resource Management Program for the Ilocos Coast (CRMP-Ilocos Coast), for instance, which evolved from the Lingayen Gulf Coastal Resource Management Project implemented in 1988 to 1992, has contributed to the increasing body of knowledge on best practices in coastal resource management (CRM) implementation in the Philippines. The CRMP-Ilocos Coast, a special program initiated by the Regional Development Council of the Ilocos Region in 2001, covers the 4 provinces, 6 coastal cities and 49 coastal towns in the northern part of the Philippines.
Member local governments of the CRMP-Ilocos Coast who participated in the East Asian Seas Congress 2009 learned about Bataan’s efforts in implementing ICM, which were highlighted on several occasions during the Congress. This triggered a study visit by representatives from the CRMP-Ilocos Coast to Bataan in April 2010. The site visit served as a platform for the two programs to share their best practices in program implementation. The CRMP-Ilocos Coast team recognized the private sectors’ participation as one of the unique features of the Bataan ICM Program. Bataan on the other hand recognized the development of a harmonized and unified CRM project implementation for the entire Ilocos region as a remarkable achievement of CRMP-Ilocos Coast. Opportunities for strengthening and improving program implementation were identified, including the possibility for the CRMP-Ilocos Coast to adopt PEMSEA’s integrated information management system (IIMS) and State of the Coasts (SOC) reporting system, which have been established by the Bataan ICM program.
Overall, it was concluded that experiences of Bataan and CRMP-Ilocos can be very useful for other interested local governments in the Philippines, in their bid to develop their own ICM programs and eventually contribute to the scaling up of ICM in the country.
PEMSEA Transformation Prioritized at the 8th Executive Committee Meeting
