Sustainable environmental management of marine regions: the Black Sea case study

The EU Marine Strategy Directive (2008/56/EC) proposes four marine regions as a political geographic framework for implementation of the Community's environmental policy. This study critically analyzes the state-based approach, which the Directive uses to outline the regions' boundaries. It suggests that environmental sustainability of marine odies strongly depends on the geographic congruence between their watersheds and the borders of the respective environmental management system, i.e., marine regions have to be environmentally managed within their watersheds. The proposed watershed-based approach also takes into consideration all elements – water, land, and air – of marine regions, which is a conditio sine qua non for their integrated and sustainable management. In the case of the Black Sea region in particular, the borders of a watershed-based environmental management system include a much wider set of stakeholder countries and enable a higher level of environmental cooperation among them.