Many large cities of China and ASEAN member countries, with forty percent of world population are distributed in the coastal zone. Due to the geological setting and high population on the coastal zone, China and ASEAN member countries are under the serious threats of coastal hazards. Over the last few decades, the impacts of these natural disasters and anthropogenic hazards have grown significantly and remain considerable challenges in the region. Deep understanding on coastal-marine geology, with an effective integration and interpretation of coastal-marine data are critical to adequately address the requirements for an effective coastal zone management.
To meet the demands of AMCAP-III Phase I and enhance the cooperation with the ASEAN member countries under the ASOMM+3 platform, to exchange experiences and technology in the field of geosciences research, the Chinese government proposed the cooperation with all the ASEAN member countries on marine geoscience capacity building and coastal and marine geohazards reduction and prevention. CGS is going to implement a five-year cooperation plan in this field. The main purposes are:
In order to fully understand current status and demands of marine geoscience capacity building for ASEAN member countries, to exchange knowledge and new technologies of marine geology mapping, coastal geohazards monitoring and map compilation, and discuss the future cooperation between China and the ASEAN member countries, China affirmed to host the "Workshop on Capacity Building on the Marine Geoscience and Geohazards Reduction & Prevention for ASEAN Member States", which to be held in Guangzhou, China from 26 September to 30 September, 2016.
The Workshop acts as the initiation for the China-ASEAN five years' Marine Geoscience Cooperation Plan, and the ASEAN member countries are welcome to participate in this Cooperation continuously in the future.