A DEcision MAking ( DEMA) Tool to Be Used in Ecosystem-Based Management System (EBMS) Applications

2018 
Beaches are basically managed mirroring user’s perception and normative requirements to obtain performance standards or distinctions made on well-known Quality Management Systems and/or Environmental Management Systems. However, when these systems are used in the management of these natural public goods, present practices do not fit with the Ecosystem Approach Strategy (EA) launched by United Nations at the end of last Century. To overcome this reality, an application of the Ecosystem-Based Management System (EBMS) was developed recently as a formal way to practice this approach at the beach social-ecological system. The EBMS is a stepwise process that combines environmental quality and risk management system theory with the EA principles. The EBMS is composed of three interactive pillars: Managerial, Information and Participatory. The Managerial pillar is the “engine” of the EBMS, following the classical Plan-Do-Check-Act managerial policy scheme. As a part of the Planning phase, a factual approach to decision making is suggested: DEMA (DEcision-MAking) tool. DEMA is a formal prioritization tool intended to help managers to determine, based on a social cost-benefit analysis and the vision established for a particular social-ecological system, which projects should be the first. DEMA uses risk management theory to decide what future activities should be selected in the policy cycle to avoid those identified risks that could impede us to get the desired vision for the beach under management. DEMA is using a framework of indicators related to the identified ecosystem services given by these systems, valuating and rating them to further prioritization of actions.
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