Políticas ambientais marinhas e costeiras, educação ambiental e avaliação de impactos ambientais como processos integrados para a gestão ambiental e sustentabilidade

Abstract

Human development has caused several environmental impacts, including marine pollution, environmental degradation and the loss of ecosystem services. This process highlights the importance of effective public policies aimed at conserving natural resources, in addition to the use of integrated Environmental Management tools, such as Environmental Education (EE) and Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). Therefore, this research seeks to investigate the relationship between the ocean and society, the relevance of Marine and Coastal Environmental Policies (MCEP) in Brazil, the functions of Environmental Education (EE) for the effectiveness of these policies and the main anthropic impacts that affect island ecosystems and coastal areas, given their heightened vulnerability to the impacts of tourism. Thus, an exploratory analysis of the legislation aimed at the conservation of marine resources in Brazil was carried out, besides qualitative bibliographic research, development and application of an ecosystem-based Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) methodology on two islands with strong tourist relevance in the state of Santa Catarina, Brazil, in addition to an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) using interaction networks, also based on ecosystems, at Praia dos Ingleses, located in the north of Florianópolis – SC. The results showed that, with the Covid-19 pandemic, many impacts were accentuated, such as the problem of plastic in the marine environment, demanding joint actions and shared responsibility. In addition, relationships can be established between sea conservation policies and Environmental Education actions that can contribute to the reduction in anthropic impacts at sea. The importance of an ecosystem approach focused on the local reality in the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) processes was also highlighted. It is concluded that there is a great gap between some theoretical and practical actions addressed by Marine and Coastal Environmental Policies (MCEP) in Brazil, that social participation and shared responsibility are still slow in the country and the ecosystem- based Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is a fundamental instrument for the coordination of measures aimed at the conservation of natural resources and sustainable development in island and coastal ecosystems, and Environmental Education must be integrated in this process and stimulated by the Government.