IV-1 



PART IV 



iriTRODUCTior: 



The comprehensive management program presented in Part III estab- 

 lishes a framework to regulate man's activities in the estuarine 

 zone to preserve and develop the estuarine resource while achieving 

 full use of it. Effective management, however, must be firmly 

 based on an understanding of what the estuarine resource is, what 

 use it has to man, and what impact man's activities have on it. 



The comnrehensive management Drogram is in essence a working rela- 

 tionship amonn the institutional, biophysical, and socioeconomic 

 environments in the estuarine zone. This Part of the report deals 

 with the existing relationship between the biophysical environment 

 and the socioeconomic environment. It describes first the estuarine 

 zone without, man*, then it considers how man uses the estuarine zone 

 and how these activities affect the land, the water, and the life. 

 Finally, it seeks to show what will happen to the estuarine zone 

 unless man controls his impact on this part of his environment. 



The biophysical environment divides naturally into ten oeoaraohical 

 regions, each dominated by a different combination of environmental 

 conditions. The discussion revolves about these biophysical reoions 

 as the primary subdivisions of the natural environment of the 



