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T.B. Hernandez
presented to be discussed by the Cuban Authorities. It includes among others the following regulations:
• Protection and sustainable use of their components and natural characteristics;
• Monitoring and government environmental inspection to warrant their integrity and
to achieve the use it was aimed at;
• Establishment of measures aimed at insuring the free use and public enjoyment,
without charge, of the coastal and the buffer zone;
• Assessment of the environmental impact of the works, facilities and other actions
that take place in it and to grant Environmental Licenses for developing the first;
• Environmental planning of the uses of the coastal and buffer zones;
• Actions for improvement and rehabilitation, whenever convenient;
• \ Implementation of mechanisms to guarantee the rational use, protection and
"in vivo" conservation of coastal and marine biological diversity;
• Development of multidisciplinary scientific research;
• Planning of economic activities.
The Decree-Law project includes, in the first place, a group of basic definitions of
the elements that constitute the coastal zone. The aspects regulated by this Decree-Law
are the following:
1. Management;
2. Establishing landmarks;
3. Limiting property rights;
4. Allowed and forbidden uses;
5. Environmental licenses for construction projects or other activities;
6. Constructions;
7. Economic activities;
8. Pollution from land and other sources;
9. Waste dumping;
10.Extraction of building material;
11. Mining activitie$;
12. Human settlements;
13. ~rotection and use of biological diversity;
14. Fragile ecosystems (beaches, coral reefs, wetlands, mangroves, keys and peninsulas);
15. Economic regime;
16.Misdemeanors and sanctions;
17. Administrative competence.
It is important to point out that a new frame law for the Environment was approved
by the Cuban Parliament in 1997 (Ley de Medio Ambiente 1997). A whole chapter in it
is devoted to the protection of marine waters and marine resources. It establishes clearly
that the protection of marine waters includes marine inner waters, territorial waters,
the adjacent zone and the economic adjacent zone.
Also, important for coastal zone protection are other legal bodies, most of them already approved related to the following items: Environmental Impact Assessment, State
Environmental Inspection, Hazardous Wastes" Ozone Layer Depleting Substances, Pro-
T.B. Hernandez
presented to be discussed by the Cuban Authorities. It includes among others the following regulations:
• Protection and sustainable use of their components and natural characteristics;
• Monitoring and government environmental inspection to warrant their integrity and
to achieve the use it was aimed at;
• Establishment of measures aimed at insuring the free use and public enjoyment,
without charge, of the coastal and the buffer zone;
• Assessment of the environmental impact of the works, facilities and other actions
that take place in it and to grant Environmental Licenses for developing the first;
• Environmental planning of the uses of the coastal and buffer zones;
• Actions for improvement and rehabilitation, whenever convenient;
• \ Implementation of mechanisms to guarantee the rational use, protection and
"in vivo" conservation of coastal and marine biological diversity;
• Development of multidisciplinary scientific research;
• Planning of economic activities.
The Decree-Law project includes, in the first place, a group of basic definitions of
the elements that constitute the coastal zone. The aspects regulated by this Decree-Law
are the following:
1. Management;
2. Establishing landmarks;
3. Limiting property rights;
4. Allowed and forbidden uses;
5. Environmental licenses for construction projects or other activities;
6. Constructions;
7. Economic activities;
8. Pollution from land and other sources;
9. Waste dumping;
10.Extraction of building material;
11. Mining activitie$;
12. Human settlements;
13. ~rotection and use of biological diversity;
14. Fragile ecosystems (beaches, coral reefs, wetlands, mangroves, keys and peninsulas);
15. Economic regime;
16.Misdemeanors and sanctions;
17. Administrative competence.
It is important to point out that a new frame law for the Environment was approved
by the Cuban Parliament in 1997 (Ley de Medio Ambiente 1997). A whole chapter in it
is devoted to the protection of marine waters and marine resources. It establishes clearly
that the protection of marine waters includes marine inner waters, territorial waters,
the adjacent zone and the economic adjacent zone.
Also, important for coastal zone protection are other legal bodies, most of them already approved related to the following items: Environmental Impact Assessment, State
Environmental Inspection, Hazardous Wastes" Ozone Layer Depleting Substances, Pro-