Chapter 7
Increasing Land-Sea Synergies
and Coastal-Rural Collaboration
for a Healthy Ocean: The COASTAL
Project
Ebun Akinsete, Alice Guittard, and Phoebe Koundouri
Abstract Coastal and sea regions not only concentrate populations and intensive
economic activity but also environmental stresses and higher levels of pollution. On
the other hand, rural hinterlands face depopulation and often economic recession
while still environmentally impacting coastal regions. Land-based activities (agriculture, forestry, industries and urbanization) are directly and indirectly impacting
land, coastal and sea ecosystems (soil and river pollutions, marine water eutrophication, etc.), and the coastal regions are the downstream recipient of these land use
negative practice externalities. The EU H2020 COASTAL project, presented in this
chapter (This work has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020
research and innovation program under grant agreement N
773,782.), adopts an
innovative source-to-sea approach where at river basin scale, sea, coastal and rural
regions are seen as a whole and single ecosystem. The project seeks to improve landsea synergies in strategic business and policy decision making, and collaborations
between coastal and rural stakeholders in order to (1) create connections between
E. Akinsete (*)
ICRE8: International Centre for Research on the Environment and the Economy, Athens, Greece
United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network, Athens, Greece
EIT Climate-KIC Hub, Athens, Greece
e-mail: ebun.akinsete@icre8.eu
A. Guittard
ICRE8: International Centre for Research on the Environment and the Economy, Athens, Greece
United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network, Athens, Greece
P. Koundouri
School of Economics and ReSEES Laboratory, Athens University of Economics and Business,
Athens, Greece
United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network Europe, Paris, France
EIT Climate–KIC Hub Greece, ATHENA Research and Innovation Center, Athens, Greece
ICRE8: International Centre for Research on the Environment and the Economy, Athens, Greece
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
P. Koundouri (ed.), The Ocean of Tomorrow, Environment & Policy 57,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-56847-4_7
105
Increasing Land-Sea Synergies
and Coastal-Rural Collaboration
for a Healthy Ocean: The COASTAL
Project
Ebun Akinsete, Alice Guittard, and Phoebe Koundouri
Abstract Coastal and sea regions not only concentrate populations and intensive
economic activity but also environmental stresses and higher levels of pollution. On
the other hand, rural hinterlands face depopulation and often economic recession
while still environmentally impacting coastal regions. Land-based activities (agriculture, forestry, industries and urbanization) are directly and indirectly impacting
land, coastal and sea ecosystems (soil and river pollutions, marine water eutrophication, etc.), and the coastal regions are the downstream recipient of these land use
negative practice externalities. The EU H2020 COASTAL project, presented in this
chapter (This work has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020
research and innovation program under grant agreement N
773,782.), adopts an
innovative source-to-sea approach where at river basin scale, sea, coastal and rural
regions are seen as a whole and single ecosystem. The project seeks to improve landsea synergies in strategic business and policy decision making, and collaborations
between coastal and rural stakeholders in order to (1) create connections between
E. Akinsete (*)
ICRE8: International Centre for Research on the Environment and the Economy, Athens, Greece
United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network, Athens, Greece
EIT Climate-KIC Hub, Athens, Greece
e-mail: ebun.akinsete@icre8.eu
A. Guittard
ICRE8: International Centre for Research on the Environment and the Economy, Athens, Greece
United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network, Athens, Greece
P. Koundouri
School of Economics and ReSEES Laboratory, Athens University of Economics and Business,
Athens, Greece
United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network Europe, Paris, France
EIT Climate–KIC Hub Greece, ATHENA Research and Innovation Center, Athens, Greece
ICRE8: International Centre for Research on the Environment and the Economy, Athens, Greece
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021
P. Koundouri (ed.), The Ocean of Tomorrow, Environment & Policy 57,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-56847-4_7
105