The Bulgarian-Dutch project, entitled My Coast, for the economic development and environmental protection of the Bulgarian Black Sea coast is almost complete. It was started two years ago, in early 2007, when Bulgarian authorities first approached the Dutch government with a request for assistance in managing the fast-developing Black Sea economy, Bulgarian National Radio said on January 30 2009.

The government of The Netherlands has since allocated 400 000 euro for the project under various pre-accession programmes.

René Boesten, head of the Dutch arm of the project, has been working on various environmental projects in Bulgaria since 1997. In 2003, he set up Povvik-Mec, a consultancy firm that works in the field of management and environment co-operation, according to Gorichka.bg.

My Coast was initiated by the Bulgarian Ministry of Regional Development. The Black Sea coast, with its tourism and industry and the ports in Varna and Bourgas, is of paramount economic importance for Bulgaria. However, there are different and often conflicting economic spheres of influence that compete for its limited assets, such as land, employees and natural resources.

According to Boesten, "the pressure exerted on the resources is higher than in other regions in Bulgaria and also the contrasts between the economic actors are stronger. Tourism and industrial activities don't have a natural match. Therefore, we consider the Black Sea coastal zone to be the entire economic zone: from the 12-mile zone in the sea to the administrative borders of the three regions", he said, as quoted by Gorichka.bg.

My Coast is can trace its origins to the Dutch experience with its own coastline. It began with the idea of protecting the western part of The Netherlands from the sea.

"That is why we call this the polder model. Present-day examples are the new development of the Port of Rotterdam (a discussion among nature, economy and residential interests), and the protection of the Wadden Sea in the northern part (nature, protection against the sea, gas and oil and fisheries interests). The idea is to maximise the economic potential and benefit from the area while giving maximum protection to the environment," Boesten said.