%0 Journal Article 
%A García Onetti, Javier
%A García Velázquez, Marina
%A Andrés García, María de
%A Rayo Luengo, Silvia
%A Ramírez Guerrero, Gema
%A Fernández Enríquez, Alfredo
%A García Sanabria, Javier
%A Arenas Granados, Pedro Jesús
%A Pegorelli Gomes, Camila
%T Integrated and Ecosystemic Management in Socio-Ecological Port Systems. The Case of the Port Of Cadiz Bay (Spain)

%D 2025
%U http://hdl.handle.net/10498/39854
%X There is a widespread commitment in Andalusia to move towards sustainable development, but the ecological transition poses challenges. In this sense, there are territorial locations where these challenges are especially difficult to face. The large urban and port complexes of the Andalusian coast, located in large semi-enclosed coastal systems (bays, estuaries), stand out. These systems are characterized by the fact that they concentrate and interact more intensely (and in a relatively limited space), socio-economic processes related to large cities and maritime commercial ports, but also natural processes associated with an enormous diversity of particularly unique ecosystems.
Maritime ports play a fundamental role in world trade. They serve as vital channels for the movement of goods and promote economic growth at all levels (in Spain, ports facilitate the transit of 80% of imports and 60% of exports). However, their operational activities and development can generate various socio-environmental impacts on their surroundings. While it is important to recognise the economic benefits that seaports bring, there is an urgent need to proactively address and mitigate their environmental footprint, improving the relationship of the port with the city in which they are located and, beyond that, with the ecosystems of the coastal complex in which they are based.
Achieving a balance between the continued growth of these critical port centres, the cities that surround them and sustainable development is crucial to foster a resilient and responsible maritime industry that aligns with broader conservation objectives, in a context of accelerating global change process. To address these challenges, the maritime industry has witnessed an increase in the importance of green and sustainability initiatives. International bodies, such as the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) and the European Union (EU), together with external pressures from stakeholders, have driven a greater focus on environmental responsibility. Port organisations, exemplified by the European Sea Ports Organisation (ESPO), are also aligning themselves with the objectives of the European Green Deal and the Sustainable Development Goals with a trend towards the adoption of "green" policies, emphasizing environmental protection practices in infrastructure development and the formulation of sustainable policies.
In the specific context of Andalusia, its commercial seaports are part of the national network of ports of Spain and in that framework, Puertos del Estado published in October 2022 the “Strategic Framework of the port system of general interest (2022-2030)”, which defines the future trajectory of Spanish ports, including ambitious strategic lines of an environmental and social nature. Andalusian seaports, located in those particularly vulnerable and fragile environments, must take on the enormous challenge of reducing this social and environmental impact, even more so with the growing commitment to the blue economy. However, the port system usually focuses its environmental management efforts on meeting specific administrative environmental requirements, concentrating its activity on monitoring, especially within the port. These efforts, therefore, are not sufficiently systematized or integrated into an advanced environmental management system. According to the latest ESPO Environmental Report, these efforts pay special attention to issues such as water quality, waste management and the search for improved energy efficiency, but aspects such as the monitoring of terrestrial and marine ecosystems are practically neglected. Although it is noted that 92% of European ports have implemented an environmental monitoring programme, there is a significant deficit of indicators related to territorial management. On the other hand, with this environmental monitoring, the environmental assessments obtained are partial, limited, based on approaches more appropriate to infrastructure management, not contributing sufficiently to understanding their interaction with the coastal-marine territory that surrounds them. These assessments do not bring ports closer to coastal management and spatial planning efforts, which need to be ecosystemic and integrated.
The Port of the Cadiz Bay (in Andalusia, Spain) is a good example in this regard. It is located in a unique location, with a large bay surrounded by exceptional and legally protected natural areas, loaded with a voluminous maritime cultural heritage, vulnerable and undervalued, but also with populations fragmented by intertidal ecosystems, in which half a million inhabitants are concentrated. This work summarises the analysis of the port environmental management carried out by the Cadiz Bay Port Authority. Despite significant progress, it is still some way from the level observed in other neighbouring ports, such as the Port of Algeciras. On the other hand, proposals are made to incorporate this systemic and integrated vision into the analysis of the port and the entire socio-ecological system with which it is related. With this vision, the relationship between natural ecosystem and human ecosystem will be better understood as an interaction that is not only negative. Ports themselves can have enormous operational benefits derived from the green infrastructures that surround them, if the services they provide are maintained. Are they aware of this? Do they identify or study these relationships? Do they incorporate them into their general planning and management? The proposed evaluation methodology studies and shows these positive and/or negative effects of the port on its environment (urban and natural), but in a novel way, also the effect of the environment on the port itself. This leads to interesting conclusions for the territorial management of the port and for its transfer to other socio-ecological port systems in Andalusia and Spain.
%K Port system
%K Environmental management
%K Integrated Coastal Zone Management
%~ Universidad de Cádiz