Recent Trends and Challenges of Coastal Resource Management Projects in Thailand

As the stock of marine resources are showing declining trends, the marine fisheries development policy in Thailand has focused on the conservation and sustainable utilization of resources. Many projects for coastal resource management have been planned and implemented during the recent decades. The purpose of this study is to define the groups of coastal resource management projects (CRMPs) in Thailand that has been implemented by Department of Fisheries. The level of participation from fishers and their communities is the first of the criteria used to group CRMPs. There is a wide variation of participation in CRMPs. The second criteria used for defining projects is their target activities. There are various types of activities implemented for CRMP, including the provision of fisheries-related infrastructures for communities, to encourage fishers to form groups, to rehabilitate and enhance coastal resources, to raise capacity building of human resources and promote self-regulatory fishing activities. Some activities have been successful, but some have failed. The critical third criteria is the level of legal support to CRMPs, that may be classified as participation in the decision-making process, self-rule making, protecting their voluntary-based activities, and devolving authority for management at local level. By using these criteria to group CRMPs, the study will illustrate models on CRMP and forecast a future direction of policy for coastal resource management. To achieve the effectiveness of coastal resource management, government should not only implement projects with clear understanding and full participation from fishers and their communities, but also support a legal framework for their activities.Keywords: Trends and challenges, Fisheries Management for Coastal Fisheries, Target activities, Defining criteria, Legal support for local management, Participatory approach, Coastal resource management project, Fisheries EconomicsKeywords: Trends and challenges, Fisheries Management for Coastal Fisheries, Target activities, Defining criteria, Legal support for local management, Participatory approach, Coastal resource management project, Fisheries Economic

Strategy and Dilemma for Re-Building Coastal Community to Restore Sustainable Resource in Phang-Nga Bay, Thailand

Hundreds of coastal communities located in Phang-nga Bay were exacerbated by Tsunami explosion. Fishers and fish cage farmers accidentally lost their means of fishing and culturing operations to stabilize their conventional livelihoods. The article is placed with two objectives in order to simply describe the re-building of coastal community for restoring sustainable resources. The first objective is to identify dilemmas, which were fishers and fish farmers confronted, have obstructed to restore household economy and livelihoods reaching at the pre-Tsunami level. The second objective is to describe strategy used to facilitate fishers’ participation in coastal resource management. To figure out the two objectives, interviews with fishers were conducted at hazard sites particular in Phang-nga Bay. Data and information concerned the relief action plan were gathered from the Department of fisheries (DOF), Thailand and any agencies related. The DOF took a major role to formulate relief action plan. The agency provided an immediate financial relief to lost/damaged fishers and fish farmers. They immediately received the amounts of the financial aid to carry on their conventional livelihoods. They also obtained the certain amount of financial assistance for re-constructing their means of fishing operations and fish cage cultures. On the other hand, fishers and fish farmers themselves agree to conventionally utilize the same fishing grounds for capture fisheries and fish cage culture as they did before the Tsunami disaster. This is a customary strategy to manage users and newcomers entering into fisheries. The dilemmas were mainly concerned the difficulty to receive the relief and inadequate amount of financial assistance for re-engagement in fisheries. Thus, the relief action plan is strategy vital to re-build household economy. In addition, fishers’ self-management is traditional strategy to manage priority of resource utilization