Some things transcend geographical, class or intellectual boundaries and affect each once of us, regardless of our location, status or opinion. The weather and the devastating consequences it can reap is one such phenomenon. We are all familiar with the fact that global warming is threatening to change the way we live. It will be news to very few people in this country that this autumn's floods are unlikely to be an isolated freak occurrence. The planet is changing fast and in this country we are having to get used to weather systems that were previously only seen in sub-tropical locations.

The danger posed to low lying areas close to major rivers and their tributaries has been well publicised, but one of the areas most at risk is our coastline. And as we shall see, our shores are under threat from more than just the rising tides.

Great Britain has been a marine nation for hundreds of years. We are an island country that boasts the longest coastline of any EU member state - there are over three thousand miles of coastline in England and Wales alone.

So what, you might ask. What is so good about coastline?

Not only are Britain's diverse coastal landscapes pretty beautiful (between a third and a half of the coastline of England and Wales is designated for its natural or scenic beauty), they are both ecologically and economically important. In the natural world, coastal areas are tremendously important.

Not only do they provide us with important areas of geological interest, they also provide a unique natural habitat for a diverse range of plant and animal wildlife. One fifth of protected species are found in coastal areas and a quarter of English coastline is covered by ecologically important salt marshes.

The economic importance of our shores is at least as weighty. Nowhere in England are you more than 70 miles from the coast. Thanks to water-based trade routes, the coast has always been an important place to live. Even today, nearly 75 percent of the population live within 30 miles of the coast and more than fifteen percent live within just 1 km of an estuary.

Many of our major cities and industrial port complexes are concentrated along coastlines and major estuaries. Look around the country - from Plymouth to Newcastle, major towns and cities are sited on the edge of our land mass. Coastal and marine related industries and services such as oil, gas, leisure, tourism, defence, shipping and marine insurance contribute over £50 billion - almost 5% of UK GDP - and support millions of jobs. If the coastline is subject to radical change, the impact on our economy will be no less dramatic.

Most of us now know something of the threats that are posed by the effects of climate change. International leaders have again been meeting to debate the contents of a document that warns of irreversible changes to the global environment. Flooding and desertification - the extreme polarisation of climates - these will be the end game of a process that will see shrinking glaciers, the thawing of permafrost and the melting of the polar ice-caps, submerging huge areas of land in the process.

Tropical diseases will spread to new territories, carried by insects and animals that migrate in search of more suitable habitat. Many species of plant and animal will fail in their search and will be wiped out entirely. Mankind will also take part in the relocation as many areas that already suffer extreme weather conditions simple become uninhabitable. There will be massive damage to eco-systems all around the world, from the English hedgerow to the Australian coral.

Not only will Britain be more prone to flooding in low lying coastal areas, but we will witness retreating shorelines, erosion of salt marshes and widespread risk of landslides, existing problems that will be exacerbated by rising sea levels. It won't just be the odd house perched on a cliff-top that comes under threat - the land that will be at risk from coastal erosion and flooding represents a considerable chunk our human and economic assets, including major cities and infrastructure.

5 percent of the population and 1.5% of the land area are at risk from flooding by the sea. Farmers will be particularly hard hit, as 50 percent of Grade 1 agricultural land is less than 5m above sea level. Much of this land is already prone to flooding in times of extreme weather, as a large proportion has been reclaimed from the sea in the past. The sea may soon reclaim it back.

Regardless of whether or not you believe that mankind has been instrumental in the global warming process, the evidence suggests that there is a lot more that we could have done to protect our natural and economic assets.

Poor planning in the past has left all sorts of property vulnerable to natural hazards. Hundreds of billions of pounds worth of residential commercial and industrial assets are at long term risk of coastal flooding and erosion. Many of the defences currently in place are insufficient and unsustainable and will simply not cope with climate and coastal change.

Man-made erosion accounts for more damage to our coastline than the natural elements. Inland quarries are not the only source of material used in our construction industry. Much of the aggregate used in buildings comes from offshore excavations - around 40 million tonnes are extracted each year.

Pollution is a major problem. Shipping, local industry and tourism all play their part in dirtying the waters and filling the natural environment with our waste products. It is estimated that one million birds and up to 100,000 marine animals die each year from entanglement or ingestion of plastics alone. Sea-borne species fare little better. Damage to the aquatic environment and coastal habitats that act as spawning grounds, over fishing and the EU common fisheries policy has led to so much depletion of the fish stock that we are now contemplating eating our chips with alternatives to cod, haddock or plaice.

Despite so many cities and industries being sited by the seaside, it is not always a happy place to be. Many coastal communities suffer above average unemployment. Traditionally dominant sectors such as the leisure and tourism industries offer a high proportion of low paid, part time or seasonal jobs, leaving many without full-time year round employment.

Add to this the high number of residents above the age of retirement, a brain drain of educated and skilled workers that is not compensated for by the influx of long-term unemployed, and it is easy to see why nearly half of the most quickly deteriorating districts in the UK are coastal areas.

Local government is playing a major role in co-ordinating the regional coastal strategy. A Special Interest Group on Coastal Issues has put forward a consultation paper to help formulate a managed strategy to address the problems outlined above. It will look to promote the environmental well-being of the coast and the sustainable social and economic regeneration of its communities.

To do this, it is looking towards so-called "joined up solutions", which require co-operation and support on a local, regional, national and pan-European level. A combination of central policy planning and local prioritisation and problem solving will hopefully allow this country to implement an integrated approach to protecting the assets that we have and utilise the untapped opportunities that still exist around our coastal areas.

The approach will see a large number of agencies getting involved in specific partnerships each with key areas of responsibility - The English Coastal Forum, The Coastal Policy Unit, Coastal Commission, Environment Agency, Maritime Foresight Panel and many others.

It is good to see an approach to tackling the problems that involve everyone from top level ministers right down to local committees and action groups. Whilst there is always a danger of too many cooks spoiling the broth, such multi-level support is probably vital if changes are to be made across the board. Unfortunately, because the plans are still only at the consultation stage, many of the proposals are fairly woolly and offer little detail as to what the solutions will actually be.

On the positive side, our Government has signalled its good intentions by setting the consultation process in motion and by introducing a range of measures to cut greenhouse gases. There are initiatives in the areas of emissions, renewable energy use, energy efficiency performance and a new waste strategy to reduce our reliance on landfill and to cut methane emissions.

However, even if we manage to get local, regional, national and EU-wide co-operation on implementing solutions to the problem, the fact remains that climate change is truly a global problem and any solutions must be worldwide ones. Some of our international allies have yet to show that they are willing to make the social and economic investments that are called for to enable the solutions that have so far been proposed. Until they are prepared to do so, we are highly unlikely to see the prospects improve.

The Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change has now published two reports, one which predicted that global temperatures could rise by as much as 5.8C over the next century and one that highlights the major effects of such projections. The third volume, on possible ways of dealing with the consequences of climate change, will be released next month. Hopefully, it will make some far-reaching recommendations that will kick start a sea-change in the worldwide approach to this issue.