Partial Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment - Amendment of the West of Scotland Nature Conservation Marine Protected Area (NCMPA) site boundary

Benefits

Option 1: Do nothing

No proposed additional benefits expected to arise from this policy option.

Option 2: Amendment to site boundary under the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009

Amendment to the West of Scotland MPA will seek to resolve an error in the original site designation extending beyond the continental shelf and into the Special Area and Faroese Continental shelf limit claims. This will help to ensure exclusive management competence for the entire MPA and allow future management measures to be implemented across the whole site to achieve the required conservation objectives.

There are no further proposed benefits to arise from this boundary amendment as this policy is unlikely to have significant impacts to the MPA. Partial BRIAs relating to the implementation of proposed future fisheries management measures will capture the benefits expected to be achieved from that policy implementation.

Contribution to an Ecologically Coherent MPA network

This boundary amendment will continue to help to conserve the range of biodiversity in the West of Scotland MPA and for Scotland as a whole and will contribute to establishing an ecologically coherent network of marine protected areas. The boundary amendment will help to ensure the Scottish Government has exclusive management competence across the whole site, so any necessary future management measures to achieve the conservation objectives can be implemented.

As stated above, Should Option 2 be selected and the West of Scotland site boundary be re-drawn to exclude the overlap with the Special Area and Faroese Continental Claim limit, it is JNCC’s scientific opinion that this will not adversely affect the ecological integrity of the West of Scotland MPA, due primarily to the relatively small scale in site size reduction and the relative sparseness of feature records in the area.

Ecosystem services benefits and non-use value

The boundary amendment of the West of Scotland MPA will continue to have the same continued ecosystem services benefits with the original designation and under option 1. The boundary amendment of the site will continue support the conservation objectives of the site and its features. No added additional ecosystem services benefits or non-use values benefits are expected to be assumed with the boundary amendment of the site that were not already captured within the original designation.

Commercial Fisheries

Benefits have been evaluated based on the comparison of boundary amendment of the MPA to the current designation of the MPA with the existing management measures in place. The are no proposed additional benefits expected under the option of the boundary amendment as the only change will be to the existing site boundary which will be reduced by only 2.14%, all existing management measures will remain the same.

There is a formal agreement between the UK and the Kingdom of Denmark and the Government of the Faroe Islands which provides for the Faroese “Special Area” or Faroese Grey Zone, an area where the UK shares certain rights and jurisdiction (including fisheries) with the Kingdom of Denmark and the Faroe Islands. In this zone both parties can manage their own fisheries as they see fit. This means the Faroe Islands manage their own fisheries within this area. The removal of this area and amendment to the MPA boundary will not impact fisheries access to this area, as it will not affect the agreement and the licensing of vessels with permission to access the Special Area. Amending the boundary and removing the overlap with the Special Area will mean Scottish Ministers would have full jurisdiction within the NCMPA for any future fisheries management required to ensure conservation objectives of the site are being met.

Public Sector Costs

A benefit to amending the site boundary would be that it would aid compliance and enforcement without incurring additional costs by simplifying the enforcement requirements currently for the site and any enforcement of future fisheries management measures.