National Litter and Flytipping strategy: island communities impact assessment

2. Gathering data, identifying evidence gaps and identifying stakeholders

As the majority of marine litter originates from land-based sources, the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy is closely aligned with the recently refreshed Marine Litter Strategy which has links to the Scottish Islands Federation for the purpose of developing solutions to tackle marine litter.

A recent study by Marine Scotland suggests that more than 90% of plastic in Scottish seas comes from Scottish littering on land. Scottish littering puts about 1,000 tonnes of macro plastic into Scottish seas each year (uncertainty range 700 to 2,500 tonnes).^[8] Island communities may be disproportionately impacted by beach litter, firstly as a significant proportion of the population lives close to beaches, and secondly as beaches are an attraction for tourists, who contribute to the local economy. There are potential impacts on health and well-being, as well as wider considerations for the economy, biodiversity and the local environment. Actions related to the strategy which bring about a reduction in litter could have a positive impact. Marine sourced litter will be considered as part of the dedicated Marine Litter Strategy, which includes litter on beaches. ^[9]

We are also aware of the impact of litter on tourism. Tourism is a significant industry for the islands. Prior to Covid, Highlands and Islands Enterprise indicated an average annual visitor spend of £1.5bn in the region and 3,200 registered tourism businesses. Tourism jobs represented up to 43% of the workforce in some areas.^[10] The environment and wildlife are significant drivers in attracting visitors, who want to enjoy an unspoilt landscape and coast. The presence of litter has an impact on their enjoyment of this environment, and therefore any reduction in litter could have positive impacts in attracting more tourists and spending for local businesses.

Work undertaken for previous ICIA has identified that island authorities face higher costs per capita in collecting, transporting and disposing of waste. This is in part because the rural nature of collection routes means they are less efficient: the Scottish Government Urban Rural Classification highlights that the majority of the island authorities have high proportions of their populations in very remote small towns and rural areas.^[11] Additional costs are incurred because waste must often be transported off island for processing as there are a limited number of operational landfill sites located on islands. Measures associated with the strategy could impact on the volumes of waste collected.

People living in island communities may face additional barriers to responsibly disposing of items. There is less consistency in kerbside recycling collections and the density of household waste recycling centres is much lower than on the mainland. The Highlands and Islands also have higher rates of community ownership of land, an estimate in 2017 indicated that there were 547,690 acres in community ownership in Scotland, with 70% of that total (384,980 acres) located in the Western Isles.^[12] In these communities there may be additional challenges associated with waste management and responsibility for clearing flytipping. However, it should be noted that we do not currently have evidence to indicate the scale of the litter and flytipping problem on the islands, which will be critical for determining the potential impact.

Access to broadband and 4/5G may be important, if the strategy results in monitoring, communications or interventions which are delivered digitally. Access to digital services and internet speeds on islands have improved significantly in recent years, but there is space for further improvement.^[13] There is also considerable variation between different islands, a 2019 study found that Shetland and Orkney had the lowest speeds (6.7Mbps and 3Mbps respectively) in a survey of Scottish Local Authorities^[14]. Additionally, people living on islands and in remote rural locations require elevated household budgets to achieve a minimum acceptable standard of living. These budgets were found to be 10- 40% higher than elsewhere in the UK and in some more remote island locations, these additional costs could exceed 40%.^[15] This may be relevant to consideration of the connectivity costs for islands dwellers, particularly where there are cumulative impacts with social deprivation.

Whilst setting a clear direction of travel, both the strategy and the 2023-24 Action Plan are high level in nature and as such cannot be assessed in detail. The scale of impacts in the areas highlighted above across different island communities will be determined by the detailed design and implementation stage of individual actions set out in the high level annual Action Plans. The Governance & Delivery Framework has been designed to oversee delivery of the Strategy and Action Plans and will support mitigation of these impacts by:

• Incorporating consideration of impacts on island communities in the design and implementation of individual actions;
• Considering impacts on island communities in the identification of actions for incorporation in Action Plans;
• Engaging with Island representatives to support both of these requirements both as part of the Governance & Delivery Framework and through specific consideration as part of a stakeholder engagement plan.