CONTROVERSIAL PUBLIC DEBATE

At the center of the negotiations leading up to the Stade Conference and at the conference itself, was the draft Trilateral Wadden Sea Plan. A consultation version of the Plan in English was issued in February 1997 to enable a broad public discussion before it was finally adopted by the ministers at the Conference. The discussions in Denmark and Germany were particularly intense. In Denmark, the discussion culminated in spring and summer of 1996 with the discussion of the proposals for the Danish input to the Wadden Sea Plan. In his opening speech at the Conference, Minister Auken ironically portrayed the discussion as being the closest he had been to civil war in Denmark. In Germany, the discussion erupted with the releasing of the February consultation version and its translation into German in March and continued until the Stade Conference. In The Netherlands, the discussions on the draft Plan were less controversial, probably because a platform was established for the discussions which involved practically all representatives of stakeholders. Furthermore, a targeted discussion was initiated with relevant authorities and interest groups to attempt to solve specific issues of concern.

Why was the discussion so controversial, in particular, in Denmark and Germany? There are many reasons. A major reason is, probably, that the public discussion of the plan collided with other environmental and nature protection initiatives. The listing of the Wadden Sea area under the European Habitat Directive and the uncertainties of the consequences, the discussion in Schleswig-Holstein of the so-called "Ecosystem Research Synthesis Report", entailing a proposal for a new national park law, to mention but a few. Another major reason was the fear that the Plan, once adopted, would reduce safety standards for coastal protection and impede economic development in the Wadden Sea coastal region. In particular, in Germany, this element was predominant in the discussion and the concern was expressed that the harbor developments of the major ports, such as Wilhelmshaven, Bremerhaven and Hamburg and the associated industrial activities, would be obstructed in the future to the advantage of harbors outside the Wadden Sea Area, like Rotterdam and Antwerp. The vast majority of those concerns were eliminated and the impression was that there was an understanding that a good and acceptable compromise had been found by the ministers.

THE WADDEN SEA PLAN

The Wadden Sea Plan is politically adopted by the Stade Declaration. The Declaration itself entails some essential political statements with regard to the Plan, in particular, the fundamental need for maintaining coastal safety and the need to continue the dialogue with the stakeholders involved in the implementation of the Plan and in the preparation of proposals for the next Wadden Sea Conference.

The geographical range of the Plan is confined to the so-called Trilateral Cooperation Area, in short, the Wadden Sea Area, as agreed at the Leeuwarden Conference in 1994 which is the area between the three nautical sea mile of the coast and the dikes including the estuaries of the Ems, Weser and the Elbe up to the brackish water limit and adjacent inland wetlands of International Importance according to the Ramsar Convention and Special Protection Areas under the EU Bird Directive in Denmark, Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony.

This area is larger than the Wadden Sea national parks and nature reserves - which has been defined the Conservation Area - and they also differ in terms of their delimitations. That makes it difficult, in specific cases, to arrive at a common protection level.

The Stade Declaration acknowledges that the quality of the Wadden Sea Area may be influenced significantly by outside "sources". It is, therefore, agreed to reduce the inputs of nutrients, hazardous substances and oil and the environmental impact of relevant activities.

The Wadden Sea Plan also entails specific cardinal statements in the chapter on integrated management. A principal statement concerns the political status of the Plan. Another central statement is that unreasonable impairment of the interests of the local population and its traditional use have to be avoided. Any user interests have to be weighed on a fair and equitable basis in light of the purpose of protection, in general, and the concerned particular case.

TRILATERAL POLICY AND MANAGEMENT

At the center of the Plan are the agreements on trilateral policy and management and the trilateral projects and actions. They are based on the targets for cultural landscape, water and sediments and for the total habitats and selected species adopted at the Leeuwarden Conference in 1994. To refute a broadly shared misunderstanding: the targets do not only reflect the need for a recovery of the Wadden Sea ecosystem, but also, the necessity that human activities must also be possible in the future.

The policy and management agreements have been developed on the foundation of the targets including a status description and assessment of the situation. This provides a rationale for the policy and management and the agreed projects and actions. From the outset, it was clear that the Plan should be a comprehensive document. The policy and management agreements includes, therefore, previous decisions, in particular, those adopted at the Esbjerg Conference in 1991 and adapts it to the delimitation and the targets. Indeed, to that extent, the Plan reflects status quo.

But, there is more to it than that. Firstly, one must not forget that the current status quo has developed on the basis of the Esbjerg Declaration, so the general policy and management has improved. Secondly, many of the agreements extend previous decisions. It would be to extensive to go into all the agreements so, therefore, just a couple of examples. The mussel fishery of seed mussels, in principle, will be limited to the subtidal area and the current area of mussel culture lots will not be enlarged. In salt marshes, infrastructure works which have a permanent or long lasting impact should not be established.

Furthermore, policy and management has been agreed on for areas which previously were not explicitly subject to trilateral agreements, namely the estuaries, the dunes, the offshore zone and landscape and culture. In particular, the estuaries Elbe, Weser and Ems - within the Wadden Sea Area there is also the Danish Varde Å estuary but this estuary is not important for industries and shipping - caused a long and controversial debate. It is clear that shipping, harbor and industrial activities have priority, but also nature and environment must be considered when extending the harbors and shipping lanes. In addition, nature conservation will be applied to valuable parts of the estuaries. Moreover, the transition zone between fresh and salt water should be as natural as possible.

OUTLOOK

For a number of issues, it was too premature to develop trilateral policy and actions, primarily because there was a lack of knowledge, or the current knowledge had not yet been assessed to the extent that it could be used for policy and management. The main function of the projects and actions agreed on is to fill in that gap so that policies and management can be considered, if appropriate, at the next Conference in 4 years.

Among the bulk of projects, the following could be mentioned as an example of the broadness of activities and projects to be undertaken:

• the mapping of the cultural landscape;
• the possible effects of the enhanced sea level rise and the development of an integrated coastal defence policy;
• development of strategies for the protection and enhancement of sea grass and sabellaria reefs;
• the elaboration of plans for dynamic dune developments;
• designation of areas of special concern for cetaceans off the coast of Schleswig-Holstein and Denmark.

The projects and actions will be of great value for the future work and will constitute, it is to be assumed, the basis upon which amendments and further broadening of the Plan at the next Conference will be discussed.

The Trilateral Wadden Sea Plan constitutes both the foundation and the overall framework for the joint protection and management of the Wadden Sea. Future activities and actions will help to develop and improve that framework. And, this is probably one of its chief functions, the future agenda is jointly set, not only between the countries, but also with the different authorities, user groups and conservation groups.

But the Stade Declaration entailed more than just the Plan. A very essential decision was taken with regard to implementing a common monitoring package (see article by Marencic & Lüerßen in the present WSNL issue). This program will be vital to all future quality assessments of the Wadden Sea and the development of appropriate policies.

Another important element was the adoption of the continuation of the close collaboration with the Inter-Regional Wadden Sea Cooperation, in particular, in the fields of exchange of information on environmental impacts assessments and the support of the sustainable tourism project. This will contribute to substantially developing this issue on the trilateral level.

Undoubtedly, this Wadden Sea Conference in Stade was the most challenging of all previous conferences, both because of the comprehensiveness and the complexity of the agenda and the political sensitivity of the issues. That the Conference was concluded with the result indicated above and the vast majority of the objectives realized is, predominantly, to be credited to the German presidency in the past period which has displayed extensive efforts and skills in bringing this to a good end. The next Wadden Sea Conference will be held in 2001 under Danish presidency.

The Stade Declaration including the Trilateral Management Plan is published on the CWSS homepage (http://www.de/cwss/.)

Authors address:

J. A. Enemark
CWSS, Wilhelmshaven
E-mail: enemark@cwss.whv.net