Scottish shellfish farm production survey 2018

Introduction to the Year 2018 Survey

This report is based on the returns of an annual survey questionnaire sent to all active authorised shellfish farming businesses in Scotland. These are Official Statistics published by Marine Scotland Science in accordance with the Code of Practice for Official Statistics, https://gss.civilservice.gov.uk/policy-store/codeof- practice-for-statistics/. The cooperation of the shellfish farming industry is gratefully acknowledged. The report author acknowledges Alan Christie, Sandy Murray, Keith Mutch, Chahat Sekhon, Ronald Smith, Stuart Wallace and Andrea Warwick for their contributions to the production of this report.

Production survey questionnaires were sent to 130 businesses registered as active during 2018 (see Appendix 1). During 2018, one business became authorised and three businesses rescinded their authorisation. An owner of two businesses did not return survey forms for 2018 so an estimate of zero production provided in 2017 was used for the purposes of this year’s survey report.

The survey showed that, of the 130 businesses authorised at the end of 2018, 72 recorded sales during that year. These 130 authorised businesses farmed 329 active sites, of which 160 (49%) placed shellfish on the market. Shellfish production by business and site is presented.

LA Munro

May 2019