DESIGN AND PREPARATION A SPATIAL DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEMS (SDSS) FOR INTEGRATED COASTAL ZONE MANAGEMENT (ICZM) OF IRAN

Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) refers to a dynamic, multidisciplinary and iterative process to promote sustainable management of coastal zones. This approach has been identified as a solution to overcome the complexity of the coastal area management where diverse resources provide the most productive yet highly threatened systems in the world. Diverse viewpoints as well as conflicts among stakeholders in these areas imply difficulties in the decision making process that can result in conflict over current and future uses of the coast. ICZM is therefore concerned with providing a balance between different goals that set by stakeholders within the sustainable development framework and illustrates a general trend toward more interactive policymaking and stakeholder involvement (Van Kouwen et al. 2007). For this purpose, decision support systems (DSS) become more common to support decision making at various institutional levels.