Partial Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment (Northern North Sea) - Fisheries Management Measures within Scottish Offshore Marine Protected Areas (MPAs)

Options

The Scottish Government have assessed the three following options, each presenting differing levels of management.

There are three sites within this BRIA where a full site restriction to specified gears has been identified as the only suitable management option for supporting the achievement of the site conservation objectives. These measures are therefore the same under both Option 1 and Option 2 of this assessment.

For the assessment of the overall impact, the impact for these sites was calculated, and then added to the calculated collective impact of option 1 and to the calculated collective impact of option 2 measures to provide two figures for overall impact.

Option 1: Implement zonal feature based fisheries management measures under the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009

Option 1 represents fisheries management measures that have been informed with the best available evidence and advice from the appropriate Statutory Nature Conservation Body and developed with the fishing industry and Environmental Non-Governmental Organisations (eNGOs).

These measures have been developed with a focus on protecting features to enable conservation objectives to be met whilst allowing sustainable fishing activity and practices to continue alongside. Gears requiring management were identified from advice and evidence provided by JNCC and supported by findings within the Fisheries Assessments undertaken for each site.

Under this option, 7 of the 10 sites addressed within this BRIA are zonal measures for specified gears. Only one management proposal is presented for three sites which is a full site exclusion for fishing with specified gear. This is the case where a full site level of protection from the specified gear has been identified as the only suitable option to support the achievement the conservation objectives of the site.

Measures for Option 1 are outlined in Table 2 . Further detail for each site, including site maps is available in the Site Proposal Document.

Option 2: Prohibit damaging gears from the full site under the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009

Option 2 restricts specified fishing activity from the full site. This option does not account for the geographic distribution of features and presents a greater level of environmental protection through greater levels of fisheries restrictions. For most sites, this second option is assessed as having higher socio-economic impacts in comparison to Option 1.

Gears requiring management were identified from advice and evidence provided by JNCC and supported by findings within the Fisheries Assessments undertaken for each site. The JNCC advice and evidence is available for each site and can be accessed through the JNCC website: Resource Hub.

These measures are outlined in Table 3. Site maps can be found within the Site Proposal document in the supporting documents of the consultation.

Option 3: Do nothing - No additional Management

Option 3 is the ‘Do nothing’ option; this is the baseline scenario. Under this option, there is no change to the management measures already in place, such as the prohibition of deep sea trawling (deeper than 800m) (Regulation (EU) 2019/1241^[4]) and the use of set nets (deeper than 600m) (Regulation (EU) 2016/2336^[5]). These regulations apply to any area in Scottish waters which exceeds the depths referred to. The Sandeel (Prohibition Of Fishing) (Scotland) Order 2024 came into force on 26 March 2024 ahead of the 2024 fishery season and prohibits all targeted sandeel fishing within Scottish waters. The 20 sites being consulted on and their features have been identified as requiring fisheries management following advice from the relevant statutory nature conservation bodies (JNCC and NatureScot).

As outlined above in the Rationale for Government Intervention section, there are legislative drivers for implementing fisheries management measures in Scottish MPAs.

On the basis of these requirements, no additional management is not considered a viable option.

Sectors and groups affected

The following activities have been identified as present (or possibly present in the future) within the sites where proposed fisheries management measures are to be implemented in offshore MPAs;

• Commercial fisheries and fisheries processors
• Marine tourism
• Recreational activities
• Public sector
• Research/education bodies

The commercial fisheries sector is most likely to be directly impacted by MPA management measures, as a number of restrictions are placed on the type of vessel and gear that can be deployed within the MPA boundary. The measures under Option 1 have been developed with stakeholders from the commercial fisheries sector.

Approach to assessing costs and benefits

This section summarises the methodological approach taken to estimate the benefits and costs of the policy options presented in this BRIA. A more detailed methodology is available in Annex A.

Impacts to commercial fisheries and fisheries processors

Impacts to commercial fisheries have been estimated in terms of value of landings, gross value added (GVA) and full-time equivalent (FTE) employment. Impacts for both options are presented as a range to reflect the potential for the displacement of fishing activity to compensate for loss of landings from MPA sites. Displacement has been assessed using a displacement test (see Annex A for more detail).

Knock-on impacts to commercial fisheries supply chain (e.g. fish processors) has been assessed by estimating indirect GVA impacts, using multipliers from the Scottish Government's Supply, Use and Input-Output Tables.

Public sector costs

Public sector costs were estimated for the following broad areas based on discussions with information provided by Scottish Government Marine Compliance:

• Mechanisms to implement restrictions on fishing activity in offshore sites;
• Monitoring and control of fishing activity.

Impacts to Ecosystem Services

The term ‘ecosystem services’ relates to the direct and indirect contributions that ecosystems provide to society.

Due to data constraints and scientific uncertainty, it is challenging to monetise the expected change in ecosystem services. Instead, a qualitative assessment has been undertaken.

The analysis of changes to ecosystem services has considered both on-site and off-site impacts of management options. Off-site impacts could be positive (e.g. by supporting healthier fish stocks in the area) or negative (e.g. due to the impacts of displaced fishing vessels). On-site costs could arise as a result of alternative fishing gears (e.g. creels, nets and lines) being deployed in MPAs where management measures have excluded mobile demersal gears. An overall level of impact for each site has been defined alongside a confidence level.

Other non-quantifiable impacts

In addition to the cost, GVA and employment impacts, there are additional potential impacts that have not been quantified in the assessment but have been considered.

The implementation of management measures restricting certain gear types from operating in the sites (or parts of the sites) may result in the displacement of fishing effort from the sites. Immediate impacts may include affected vessels being required to steam further to reach fishing grounds, fish on less productive grounds or required to fish more to maintain catches, resulting in potential changes to vessels cost and revenue profiles. It’s also possible that the MPAs help populations of particular species (including commercial fish or shellfish species, and other protected biodiversity) inside the site supports a larger overall population and therefore increased abundance outside the site. There is evidence that fishers catch near a MPA can be larger than in other areas ^{[6] [7]} which will benefit commercial fishers utilising areas around the protected areas. However, to increase the robustness of these estimates, this has not been accounted for in the benefits or costs of the MPAs.