MANDATE

          The Isabela Coastal Development Office (ICDO) is locally adopting the national Executive Order No. 533 Integrated Coastal Management (ICM) strategy to safeguard the Queen Province ‘coastal and marine environment and resources and establishing supporting mechanisms for its implementation. The ICM and its correlated methods and approaches, such as coastal resource management or coastal zone management, shall be the national more so the local management policy framework to promote sustainable development of the Province coastal marine environment and resources in order to achieve “food security, sustainable livelihood, poverty alleviation and reduction of vulnerability to natural hazards’ while conserving and preserving ‘ecological integrity” (Section 1[14]). The localized ICM encapsulates coastal and marine expanses, addressing the ‘inter-linkages among associated watersheds, estuaries (river mouth) wetlands, and coastal seas, by entirely related national and local deprtments and agencies (Section 2).