• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.184-205
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• 2003

Sustainable Development(SD) is an important concept for the future of the coastal area, and for development of fishing villages. Since 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro many governments and local authorities throughout the world have been engaged in preparing and implementing $\ulcorner$Agenda 21$\lrcorner$. Many projects which previously would have been identified as environmental protection are now presented under the banner of sustainable development. Integrated Coastal Management (ICM) is an extension of sustainable development. ICM was presented as a framework for resolution of coastal use conflicts. The aim of the present paper is to assess sustainable development potential of fishing villages in Cheonsu Bay Region according to implementation of ICM. Cheonsu Bay Region was known as one of the productive fishing grounds and Cheonsu Bay Region preserved unique characteristics of traditional fishing villages. But this region is now experiencing many changes through the massive reclamation projects like Seosan A B Project. After a brief overview of concepts and history of SD and ICM, the reclamation process and its impacts on both fishery and fishing communities in Cheonsu Bay Region are discussed. According to their changing environmental and socio-economic characteristics after the reclamation, ca 35 representative coastal villages in this region can be classified into 5 types. Many coastal villages shows diversity in their economic activities, as tourism and recreation function becomes more and more important in this region. In present-day Cheonsu Bay Region, it is possible to differentiate fishing village cooperatives(FVO) with high potential of sustainable fishery development, FVOs with medium potential, FVOs with low potential on the basis of 14 selected indicators.