II. Coastal Management and Coastal Defense
4
Protection
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The economic benefits accruing from protection depend on the values of the land
being protected. Benefit categories, as measured against taking no action
include :
a)
prevention of physical damage to property as a result of waves and
flooding ;
b) prevention of loss of [economic] production and income ;
c) prevention of land loss through erosion ;
d) the prevention of loss of natural resources (environmental and recreational).
Costs include capital, operation and maintenance of the protective measures, as
well as any cultural, environmental and social changes that may result. For
example, some hard structural protection works may cause beaches to disappear.
For economies heavily dependent on tourism (e.g. Caribbean islands) this may
have serious adverse consequences. As already said, the non quantifiable aspects
of cultural, environmental and social impacts must be considered when selecting
any response strategy. Options may be restricted for some developing countries
because of costs or lack of technology.
Cost Estimates for Protection
While the potential economic developments in the next few decades are difficult
to predict, an approximation of basic implementation costs is possible. Although
any such calculations are only rough approximations, they provide a useful first
estimate and a guide for future data collection efforts. Table 1 illustrates
estimates based on a sea-level rise scenario of one meter in 100 years, for 181
countries and territories with a marine coast. These estimates show that
preventing inundation alone would cost, at a minimum some US $ 500 billion
(none discounted) in today's dollars.