Integrated Management Plan (IMP) for Bojana/Buna Area

This Bojana/Buna Integrated Management Plan (IMP) is a pilot – “real world” – application of the “Integrated Methodological Framework” (IMF). The IMP helped demonstrate and test to develop an operational methodology for the sustainable management of the ecological continuum constituted by the coastal zone, the river basin, and the coastal aquifer.

The IMP encompasses the transboundary area of Albania and Montenegro, bringing together administrative structures from the two states. The Bojana/Buna River, its catchment, and the underlying aquifers and coastal waters provide the common physical threads linking the two countries. Bringing together International Water Resource Management (IWRM) (including surface water and groundwater management), spatial planning, climate change adaptation, and Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM), the IMP adds value to the individual approaches such that ‘the whole is greater than the sum of the parts’. The experiences from the Bojana/Buna IMP development can be used as reference elsewhere in the Mediterranean basin, including to prevent preparation of separate IWRM and ICZM plans.

Project Objective:  Background - In 1997 UNEP-MAP with the financial support of GEF, initiated a comprehensive regional effort aimed at identifying and accelerating the key reforms and investments necessary to reverse negative trends threatening the Mediterranean Sea Ecosystem, and move towards sustainability. In little over 6 years, a full Transboundary Diagnostic Analysis for the Mediterranean Sea (TDA-MED) was prepared and agreed upon by the Contracting Parties to the Barcelona Convention, followed by the adoption of two Strategic Action Programs (SAPs) to address main transboundary concerns: land based pollution (SAP MED), and loss of biodiversity (SAP BIO). As a consequence, the Mediterranean countries (Trieste, Oct. 2004) agreed on a collective effort for the protection of the environmental resources of the Mediterranean, the Strategic Partnership for the Mediterranean Sea Large Marine Ecosystem, led by UNEP and the World Bank, co-funded by the GEF and involving other relevant agencies, IFIs and bilateral and multilateral donors.

The Partnership will serve as a catalyst in leveraging policy/legal/institutional reforms as well as additional investments for reversing degradation of the Mediterranean Sea Basin, with its coastal habitats and marine living resources. The Strategic Partnership, following the model of the GEF Black Sea Basin Strategic Partnership for Nutrient Reduction, consists of two complementary components:

• -a Regional Component: “Implementation of agreed actions for the protection of the environmental resources of the Mediterranean Sea and its coastal areas” led by UNEP, and the object of the present proposal, and
• -a “Partnership Investment Fund for the Mediterranean Sea Large Marine Ecosystem” led by the World Bank and already approved by the GEF Council in August 2006.

The Partnership will stimulate and further enhance the implementation at the Mediterranean level of Global Conventions and initiatives such as the CBD, the Stockholm Convention, and GPA, Regional Conventions and instruments such as the Barcelona Convention and the Mediterranean Action Plan as well as the SAPs, NAPs, and POPs NIPs in individual countries.

The main objectives of the proposed project (Regional Component) are

• (i) to ensure, in concert with the World Bank, the overall coordination of the Strategic Partnership;
• (ii) to facilitate harmonized policy, legal and institutional reforms aimed at reversing degradation trends with focus on land based pollution - particularly nutrients and PCBs, fisheries and coastal habitats, in accordance with priorities agreed by the countries in the SAP MED and SAP BIO and to prepare the ground for the future implementation of the ICZM Protocol;
• (iii) to promote the regional dissemination and replication of new approaches including those implemented/demonstrated under the Partnership Investment Fund Component (World Bank);
• (iv) to monitor the progress of the Strategic Partnership as a whole, the effectiveness of the stress reduction measures being promoted, and to establish the harmonized monitoring of the "environmental status" of the Mediterranean Sea; and
• (v) to contribute to the implementation of the Stockholm NIPs through a harmonised approach to managing PCBs in five of the participating countries that meets the requirements of the Stockholm, Barcelona, and Basel conventions.

Summary Recommendation - The IW program manager, having reviewed the documentation provided, including the numerous relevant annexes, observes the following:

• (i) The proposal adequately addresses all recommendations and comments made in previous reviews.
• (ii) The proposed project fits GEF4 IW Strategic Objective 1, and IW GEF4 Strategic Program 2 (nutrients), with elements relating to 1 (fisheries), and 3 (water use conflicts). The project also fits POPs Strategic Program 1 (Capacity building for NIP implementation) and POPs Strategic Program 2 (Investments for NIP implementation).
• (iii) The proposed project shows several strong points that are worth mentioning:
  • •Co-financing, which approaches a 1:2.5 ratio, most of it secured, including $14m in cash;
  • •the full participation of northern littoral countries (Spain, France, Italy) to project activities, and funding;
  • •the well defined set of results indicators (Process and Stress Reduction - Annex E);
  • •the innovative and comprehensive Replication Strategy, linked with strong Communication and Coordination components (Annex F);
  • •the integrated nature of the proposed approach (interlinked basin, coastal, and marine ecosystem management and interventions) and the joining of forces of focal areas (IW and POPs) around common priorities.
• (iv) The budget reflects recent GEFSEC guidance on management costs, travels and other items. Based on the above, the program manager would recommend CEO approval of Work Program Entry, following submission and review of a revised document responding to the recommendations listed below:
  • Exec. Summary Point 4.1: include Spain among donors and members of the Steering Committee;
  • - Include under the responsibility of the PMU the following activity: to identify a set of environmental status indicators reflecting SAP targets and agreements, and to promote in the countries, with the support of MAP, the harmonized monitoring of these indicators well beyond the project's life.
  • The proposed set of indicators and monitoring procedures will be presented to the Steering Committee during the Inception Meeting.
  • - Check the total figure for co-financing (which should be $23,723,200).
  • - Ensure that project will have a website according to IW LEARN criteria, and that it will participate to IW LEARN initiatives, including biannual conferences.
  • - Adequately respond to all issues on the POPs part of the project raised under the General Comments section.

The IMP demonstrated, tested, and provided feedback into the plan-making methodology developed under the Integra-tive Methodological Framework (IMF) of the MedPartnership-ICZM component. A joint management plan for the area was developed based on the guidelines of both the ICZM Protocol and the EU’s Water Framework, and refined according to local circumstances. To structure the analysis of the complex interplay between topic areas the "DPSIR" frame-work was used. The IMP was developed over a 5-year timeframe and completed in 2015.

The IMP considers impacts on the coastal zone and the Bojana/Buna basin of upstream activities from the impacts of agriculture, tourism and urbanisation, and marine impacts on the river delta and coastal aquifers. The IMP encompasses the transboundary area of Albania and Montenegro, considering the river basin and coastal zone as a single entity.

Methodology
The Bojana/Buna area is a single natural system extending into two countries, and the transboundary issues and problems addressed reflect the multi-sectoral, integrated nature of the IMP. These issues include the unsustainable spatial development; solid waste and wastewater management; agricultural, fisheries, hunting and forestry practices; and the over-extraction of groundwater and inadequate infrastructure, including flood defences.

These problems are compounded by structural economic weaknesses, including some of the lowest incomes in Europe, weak institutional and technical capacity, and an inadequate policy framework. Upstream pressures include urbanization and land use management, hydropower production resulting to increased flood risk, and pollution. The area has a high vulnerability to climate variability and change, sea-level rise, increasing salinity and extreme events. Transboundary coordi-nation at present is largely ad-hoc.

An Integrative Working Group (IWG) representing the key sectors oversaw the preparation of the IMP. Within the simple 5-Stage Plan Process roadmap defined by the parallel IMF project, the analysis of the complex interplay between issues and problems utilised the Drivers-Pressures-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) Framework. The DPSIR’s key value was in breaking down boundaries between the IWRM, ICZM, and Coastal aquifer and groundwater management, allowing an integrated approach.
In such a complex policy environment, the analysis of problems and issues does not automatically lead to the “Responses” in a simple linear fashion. A parallel dialogue was required to identify common societal objectives.

To “marry” these objectives to the policy responses, an innovative adaptation of the Bow-tie methodology developed to manage risk, typically in a complex industrial environment, was used. Simply, the method combines multiple ‘causes’ and multi-sectoral responses into a single diagram centred on a set of agreed objectives.

The IMP for Bojana/Buna area affects a terrestrial area of approximately 500km2 drawn using local administrative boundaries, along with the adjacent inshore marine zone comprises approximately half the national territorial waters. The IMP area is thus defined according to guidelines in the ICZM Protocol and the EU WFD, the ecosystem approach, refined according to local circumstances. The IMP area had a total population of over 53.000 in 2011.

The resulting IMP is a multi-sectoral approach, including measures to improve spatial planning, including the economy, water quality, land, flood and waste management, and to maintain biodiversity. The resulting measures are set according to the objectives addressed and the short-term priority actions required to achieve them. In addition, the IMP identifies potential transboundary governance structures to deliver the IMP.

The measures agreed with stakeholders are designed to improve the transboundary governance and cooperation between the two countries; support policy changes at national levels; develop the knowledge base for the management of the system; prevent, mitigate and remediate negative impacts of anthropogenic activities; raise the economic and social well-being of the area's communities; and to increase IMP area's resilience to the impacts of climate change and natural disasters. 

Each measure is further refined by the short-term priority actions required to achieve them during the short-term 2015-2020 period, along with success indicators.

The experiences can be used for replication elsewhere in the Mediterranean basin, instead of preparing separate IWRM and ICZM and other sectoral plans. The benefits of this integrated approach are the potentials for win-win solutions, generating economies of scale through shared responses, along with reducing the likelihood of conflict between sectoral interests.

The natural and physical systems of the Bojana/Buna coast do not function exclusively within national boundaries. The integration of management to include the riverine systems was absolutely necessary as the management of the upstream parts is critical to the situation downstream and vice versa.

The Bojana/Buna IMP experience tested the practical realities of defining the coastal zone as required by Article 3 of the ICZM Protocol. The landward boundary was drawn using local administrative boundaries (“competent coastal units”) that broadly conform to the physical boundary of the watershed. The marine zone included a more restricted area of the territorial waters based on a proxy measure of the main influences of land-based activities.

The scoping stage of IMP preparation demonstrated that a realistic period must be allowed in transboundary planning for harmonising data and mapping and for the engagement of stakeholders, and the governance procedures, etc. The Bojana/Buna experience illustrated that in transboundary planning, the support of relevant national governments and unified governance structures are vital, both in the preparation of the IMP and in its future delivery. Clarity of process is vital.

The preparation of the Integrated Management Plan for Bo-jana/Buna helped understand that the ultimate prerequisite of transboundary management of the joint resource are the harmonised data and monitoring procedures. Without same understanding of the process, no constructive measures could be reached. Even though the purpose of this Plan was ultimately to test the methodology its findings could be used to strengthen cooperation through joint actions for the manage-ment of the transboundary area.

REFERENCES
Priority Actions Programme/Regional Activity Centre
(PAP/RAC) www.pap-thecoastcentre.org
marina.markovic@paprac.org