Abstract
The coastal zone is a crucial environment that is experiencing pressure from a wide variety of different agents and interests. Many sandy beaches high in recreation value are suffering from increasing erosion, and the shoreline is receding in these areas despite of tectonic land uplift. Sediment deficit is evident in many places. One key problem in recent decades has been a rapid increase in the number of holiday houses built as close as possible to the seashore. Unlike in the Nordic countries, where major coastal settlement expansion took place after WWII, almost the entire coast of Estonia was, until 1991, proclaimed a Soviet border zone in which activities were strongly restricted. A revival in coastal land use and a rapid increase in coastal settlement have occurred over the last 15–20 years. This paper focuses on Climate Change impacts, natural and artificial changes on the coast of Saaremaa Island associated with increasing pressure and conflicting interests. We also examine the advantages and disadvantages of existing legislation regulating land use within the Estonian coastal zone in the context of integrated coastal zone management. The paper ends with an outlook.
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Acknowledgments
The current study has been supported by the Estonian Science Foundation grants No. 5763, 5786, 5929, 7564, 7609, the Estonian Ministry of Science and Education target-financed project No. SF0282119s02 and the ERDF funded Interreg IIIB project ASTRA. Special thanks to Dean Adam Willis for his assistance in providing English language editorial comments and suggestions.
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Kont, A. et al. (2011). Natural Development and Human Activities on Saaremaa Island (Estonia) in the Context of Climate Change and Integrated Coastal Zone Management. In: Schernewski, G., Hofstede, J., Neumann, T. (eds) Global Change and Baltic Coastal Zones. Coastal Research Library, vol 1. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0400-8_8
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