Guidelines for protection of environmental rights regarding the sea and shore: Studying coastal structure project on coastal areas in Songkhla and Prachuap Khiri Khan provinces

This research article aims to study the scope of environmental rights regarding the sea and shore and the problems of rights violations and limitations in the protection of these rights resulting from construction projects in coastal areas in Songkhla and Prachuap Khiri Khan provinces in order to propose guidelines for protection of these rights. This study is a qualitative research study conducted by methods of documentary research, in-depth interview, and focus group discussion. The ethics of this study has been approved by a qualified research ethics review committee for research involving humans. There are two issues obtained from the result of the study. First, the environmental rights regarding the sea and shore refer to the rights of all persons to access and utilise marine and coastal resources. Second, rights violations have occurred from state policies that are not consistent with the principles of sustainable development, from problems of overlapping duties and powers between organisations, and from a lack of necessary provisions of relevant laws. Consequently, the state should; (1) integrate policies and allocate duties and powers of relevant organisations to be in line with the principles of sustainable development; (2) amend the provisions of the Constitution and the Act on the Promotion of Marine and Coastal Resources Management, B.E. 2558 (2015) to guarantee relevant rights; and (3) proceed with decentralisation of powers and budgets to local administrative organisations to facilitate participation with the state in managing their own coastal areas.