http://geografia.fcsh.unl.pt/index.asp?sec=0701000000&Revista=11 International audience The French Atlantic façade represents about two thirds of the national maricultural production. It is mainly a matter of extensive open water aquaculture which appeared at the end of the XIXth century, and dominated mostly by oysterbreeding with mussel-breeding coming second. This activity stretches out over 14 000 ha, 2 400 ha of which situated on private dyked up coastal marshes, and the rest on the intertidal foreshore which here is the maritime public domain divided into concessions. The intensive aquaculture (penaeide shrimp culture, fish farming) is more limited yet a worldwide-scale enterprise can be found there. 2 500 firms employing 14 000 persons are unequally located in highly specialized areas whose production is a factor of territorial identity. vulnerable activity. Its level of development depends on the one hand, on natural conditions, on the other hand, on professional know-how, and finally, and perhaps above all, on the complex interactions between the existing activities on the land-sea interface (tourism, industrial and port activity, agriculture, urbanization, etc.), and the legal constraints in the coastal use. In spite of some problems, numerous and often exemplary initiatives, reveal the implementation of integrated coastal management experiments aiming at strengthening a sustainable aquaculture on this maritime façade.