MAL05_Danube's Delta_System_Dynamics_Model

A general conclusion of the stakeholders' meetings outlined that governance and excessive  bureaucracy are disturbing the economic activity (planning, facilities for investors (lack of), lack of  compensatory measures, tourism, infrastructure) and social areas (health, incomes, protection, jobs),  avoid real problems like the conflict between Marine Protected Areas (and restrictive measures) and  the exploitation of resources or the Danube Delta’s clogged canals and invasive species. Agriculture 
has clear impacts on both inland and coastal water quality and the locals are not aware of causes, effects and impacts of the pollution on the Black Sea and even on the surrounding neighbourhood. The agriculture is for subsistence and the area is very poor developed. Due to the Danube Delta  protected area, there is a pressure down the coastal zone for seasonal tourism (only three - four months/year). Thus, there is an artificial population “growth” that is not sustained by the “real” 
economic development. The goal of the model is to explore alternative scenarios to improve the quality of life and sustainability  within the Danube Delta Biosphere Reserve and its marine waters (Black Sea) as one of the most impacted areas along the Romanian littoral. Land-sea interactions in the coastal MAL5 region were 
identified through separate sector workshops and a combined multi-sectoral workshop as part of WP1  in the COASTAL project. Land-sea interactions are at the core of our study case.  For practical reasons due to data availability and considering that the activity on the area upstream has effect on this highly biodiverse area we will include in the model data collected for the entire county of Tulcea. The model combines the 3 main economic  activities in Danube's Delta region: agriculture, aquaculture and tourism. The core objective of agriculture sub model is to model the transformation from conventional farming vs eco  farming by trying to fulfil the EU’s recent recommendations, while assuring food security and farmer’s  competitiveness on the market. For aquaculture sub model development, the freshwater aquaculture stock was considered as  the fish farming area (ha), which has two components – normal and intensive aquaculture stocks. The  normal fish farming area is influenced by the development rate, which is a function of the spatial pressure. In the tourism sub model  we tried to answer to the following question: how far can the tourism activity can be developed in the region, without harming the environment of Danube's Delta.