Feedback from stakeholders, will be answered here.
Feedback about Marine Protected Areas
1 posts Why do you think Marine Protected Areas are a good idea?
Studland Boater wrote:
I'd say anyone who doesn't think they're a good idea has no idea of what's going on in some places. Having said that I'm going to turn it round and say the MPA is a means to an end - it's a restriction on freedom so it must be justified. I have no doubt that in places it's a no-brainer. You don't anchor in coral - you'll do damage in ten minutes that takes possibly hundreds of years to repair if it ever does. At the other extreme you don't ban swimmers from being in the water every time a dolphin's sighted within a 20 mile radius. The questions is where, why and what restrictions. I'm less concerned about single species than I am about bottom dredging,etc. Entire sea-beds are scoured and take ages to recover - long-lived, slow-growing and reproducing species are being wiped out at an unsustainable rate. But the key factor here is why - it must be possible to justify any decision made and it must be realistic. Find the problem first, then find the solution.
9 posts Do you have any concerns about Marine Protected Areas?
Stewart Leach Seaton Devon wrote:
At a recent club discussion about the proposed MPA or MCZs a very good question was asked of me, as i was the one saying that we should be engaging with the authorities as stakeholders. The question was simply "if we have identified an area where we currently fish, as a club, does that mean that we have now surrendered that as an MPA because it shows that there are fish there and therefore the anti angling groups would say protect the fish" If however an area has not been highlighted does that mean that it will not be afforded sanctuary under the scheme as it would tend to indicate a lack of fish?
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
No. The main purpose of the mapping work is to identify which sea areas are important to sea anglers, to divers, sailors, fishermen and other groups. This information will be used by your representatives on the Steering Group to plan Marine Conservation Zones in a way that minimises impacts to your activities. If your Steering Group representative knows which areas are important to you, he or she can use this information in negotiations. If an area is suggested as an MCZ for scientific reasons, and there appears to be no human activities in that area, then it is much more likely to be agreed to by the Steering Group and subsequently be recommended to Government advisors for protection.
Stewart Leach Seaton Devon wrote:
Thanks for that, I'll print off the question and reply and give the feedback to the club on our next meeting. If the steering group coordinator, of whom you mention, would wish to contact me, it may give even more credence to the role.
Studland Boater wrote:
Thanks for the honest and clear feedback - I have some concern that neither sailing nor powerboat (who are not all evil by default!!) are not very well represented in the steering group. How is the make up of the steering group determined.
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
Recreational boaters are represented on the Steering Group by Peter Bartlett from the Royal Yachting Association. Details of the Steering Group can be found on the Steering Group page on our website under the 'About us' section. The Steering Group was selected to have a fair and equal balance of stakeholder interests.
just-ice wrote:
with reference to areas around witsands bay, plymouth sound, hoe, hooe & wembury as well as the tributaries flowing through to them; does it mean people will no longer be able to swim,go angling,go winkling, musseling or cockling along these coastal areas ?, did ask my then mp about this & was informed it wouldn't affect these activities, i do hope the then mp is right about this, as alot of people do enjoy these types of activities.
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
Thank you for your feedback. The project has just submitted the Draft Final Report highlighting the locations of the potential Marine Conservation Zones (pMCZs) and potential Reference Areas. This report can be found on our website in the RESOUCES section under Progress Reports, Impact Assessments & SAP feedback. Within the vicinity of Plymouth there are the following pMCZs in the network: Whitsand and Looe Bay, Tamar Estuary and the Erme Estuary (detailed site reports on each of these pMCZs and Reference Areas including detailed maps can be found in the Draft Final Report). The designation of an MCZ may result in certain activities being managed and this will depend on how the activity impacts the features being protected. Currently the project is working on assessing what management measures may be required in each of the pMCZs in the network. The activities you are concerned about (swimming, angling, mussel and cockle gathering) are recreational activities, which generally are not cause for concern within pMCZs. However, the discussion on management of pMCZs will continue beyond the end of the Finding Sanctuary (between Natural England and responsible public authorities such as IFCAs and the MMO). If, in future, activity levels increase to a point where e.g. the gathering of shellfish was causing a problem, then management measures (e.g. voluntary measures or byelaws) might be considered. With regards to potential Reference Areas ( a section of the Erme Estuary and a section of intertidal habitat at the mouth of the Yealm), the situation is different. Reference Areas will be sites where all extraction, deposition or human-derived damage and disturbance is removed or prevented. Angling and gathering of shellfish are extractive activities and would therefore not be allowed within Reference Areas (swimming on the other hand is unlikely to be classed as causing damage or disturbance). Note the two potential Reference Areas within the areas you are interested in are small compared to the pMCZs.
barry luxton wrote:
I have great concern that mcz's will be set up with little or no benifit for the purpose that they are being designed for. The live example is Lundy where even the guys running the project have intimated it will take a total of 40 years before they can confirm if any other specis apart from lobsters and divers will benifit. That's too long a period of time to close down an area to all other users, to finally realise that the panacia of closing is not all that it's cracked up to be. This is linked with the MCS idea to close down to all, 'cept divers i note, 73 recommended areas (full protection). This is without evidence of those excluded, anglers, causing damage in the first place. Berry Head, Babbacombe areas in particular, to provide protection to sea caves, offshore sea mounts, is not good enough reason (no evidence contary) to exclude anglers. To further advise that there could be benifit in overspill areas in these two areas is mis-leading, 200' cliffs to negotiate. I fear that a huge amount of information provided, again without contary evidence will be used to create pointless restrictions, for no benifit. Reference areas are being crept in at a very late stage, are there no options avalible to concider monitoring of any proposed mcz,s on a fixed period of time to prove either way worth or worthlesness. Will there be options avalible to remove mcz's in the future if found to be not fit for purpose. Regards barry luxton
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
Thank you for your feedback. It is important to understand that the MCS “Your Seas Your Voice” campaign was run independently by the Marine Conservation Society, and was not part of the formal MCZ planning process.
The pMCZs and potential reference areas in our current network were not based on the outcome of this campaign. We have recently submitted our Draft Final Report to the national Science Advisory Panel, and our current network within the south-west region contains 58 sites in total: 45 pMCZs and 13 potential reference areas. These 58 sites have been selected to meet national Ecological Network Guidance. Decisions around the location of the pMCZs and potential Reference Areas are a result of lengthy discussions within our working groups which are made up of a range of sea users including sea anglers.
Designation of an MCZ may result in certain activities being managed (e.g. through byelaws or voluntary measures), but this will depend on the how the activity at its current level impacts the features being protected. Currently the project is working together with Natural England and public authorities (such as IFCAs) on a first assessment on what management measures may be required in each of the pMCZs in the network. These discussions will continue beyond the lifetime of our project, but at present, we are assuming that recreational sea angling will not be a problem in pMCZs. This applies to all pMCZs, including the one located at Babbacombe and Berry Head (Torbay pMCZ). Reference Areas are much smaller sites than pMCZs, and in Reference Areas all extraction, deposition or human-derived disturbance will be removed or prevented. The impact of these sites on current activities will be greater than the general pMCZs – recreational sea angling will not be allowed in Reference Areas. Reference Areas essentially provide an example of an unimpacted environment within given environmental conditions by which to compare and assess the impact of human activities. The recommendation of potential Reference Areas has always been part of our project’s task, and the requirement for these sites is laid out in the Ecological Network Guidance –this was not crept in at the end. However, you are right to notice that the work on potential Reference Areas was carried out in the later stages of the stakeholder discussions, rather than at the beginning (stakeholder group discussions on Reference Areas began in December last year). This is because potential Reference Areas need to sit within an existing Marine Protected Area or within a pMCZ – so the pMCZs had to be planned first.
The network will be submitted to Government at the end of August and will undergo a full public consultation next year before designation of MCZs takes place. The Statutory Nature Conservation Bodies plan to monitor and review MCZs, however, the details of the process by which this will happen are yet to be confirmed. Finally, if you are interested in a recent review of the evidence underpinning the potential benefits of marine protected areas, please see the PISCO report The Science of Marine Reserves.
Feedback about Finding Sanctuary
2 posts What do you like about Finding Sanctuary?
Studland Boater wrote:
I've just discovered that Finding Sanctuary are the "official" body for submitting findings to the MMO and that all these other organisations, such as yourseasyourvoices, etc. are actually charities, usually with vested interests. Could you make it absolutely clear on your website that you and your peer organisations are the only channels for supplying feedback to the MMO (unless I've still got it wrong). It would be good if you apply some pressure to these other organisations to get them to make it clear on their web-sites and media as well.
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
Thank you for your feedback. Yes, we are aware that there has been confusion between the Marine Conservation Society (MCS) Your Seas Your Voice Campaign and the Marine Conservation Zone projects. We have asked the MCS to add a clarifying statement to their website which explains the differences. We will also add something to our website to make it clear that offical recommendations to Government will be made through the MCZ projects, not by the Marine Conservation Society.
0 posts Is there any information you would like to see added to the webGIS?
5 posts How can we improve what we are doing?
Stewart Leach Seaton Devon wrote:
in order for any organisation to have credence it is important that information is both accurate and up to date. therefore when one visits the Sanctuary web site it is perplexing to find out of date information being displayed as news! pleas either keep the site up to date, moving items from the future to the past when they have occurred or scrap the site. I tell people to get on the site to gain info not to then come back to me and tell me it is "dross".
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
Yes, I agree with you. We have just had a content management system set up so that we can update the website ourselves instead of having to go through the website design company each time something needs to be changed. I have updated the news and events items and over the next few weeks I will be update the whole site to make sure it is factual.
Stewart Leach Seaton Devon wrote:
Thanks for the feedback, hopefully now the site will be kept up to date and therefore valid.
Tom Shearwater, Truro, Cornwall wrote:
I fully support the creation of MPA/MCZ areas in the waters of the south west and have every sympathy for the need to protect marine habitats from the effects of destructive practices. However, I have found information given on this process to be vague and devoid of satisfactory information on areas being considered for MPA status. I imagine that this vagueness has caused great worry among stakeholders who will be concerned that large stretches of inshore waters in the south west will be declared off-limits putting livelihoods at risk and criminalising recreational anglers, divers, kayakers, spearfishermen and other stakeholders who catch the odd fish. In this regard I feel that communication has been poor. Given that these zones have been considered for some time, and the 2 year period before they become law is ticking away, Finding Sanctuary, DEFRA and your scientific consultants need to be far more candid regarding the number of MPAs proposed and their possible sites - even if it is speculative at this stage. Being guarded will only serve to alienate stakeholders and make them feel like their needs are not being considered in the planning process. I sincerely hope that recreational users of close inshore waters in the south west will not be penalised by the creation of these areas which really need the backing of the public and those that use the water. We all know what practices cause the most destruction to marine biomass. Joe Bloggs with his fishing rod should not be criminalised.
Finding Sanctuary wrote:
Tom, Thank you for your feedback.
You’ve raised a couple of important issues here and hopefully I can give you a helpful response.
Firstly just to clarify, there are two processes occurring at the same time to identify different types of marine protected areas in the south-west. Natural England is currently consulting on proposed Special Areas of Conservation (SACs) in the south-west – these are specific sites to be designated under European legislation. There is an official consultation on their website identifying site boundaries. It is important to note that for SACs site selection boundaries must be based completely on scientific evidence (i.e.socio-economic factors cannot taken into consideration). The Finding Sanctuary project is responsible for developing recommendations for Marine Conservation Zones (MCZs), a new designation introduced through the Marine and Coastal Access Act.
Ultimately the new MCZs and new SACs, together with existing protected sites will form the network of marine protected areas that the UK Government is committed to creating by 2012.
There is no information currently available about proposed Marine Conservation Zones because none have been suggested by the Finding Sanctuary Steering Group yet. We are still awaiting official guidance to be issued by Government agencies. We hope this will set out which species and habitats are required to be protected, and other parameters such as minimum distance between areas, representativity etc. We have been told the official guidance will be issued by June 2010. Planning Marine Conservation Zones without this is not possible. However, in the meantime we have developed a set of interim guidelines for the Steering Group to work with. We developed this interim guidance as we felt the Steering Group needed to make progress on planning sites, given that the deadline for recommendations is looming. This interim guidance is available on our website under General Resources.
As you say, it’s so important that marine protected areas are supported by the public and the people who have to live with them. This is precisely why we are attempting to do things differently in this process. We do not believe these decisions should be made by authorities behind closed doors and then imposed on people. We believe that the people that stand to be affected by these decisions should be involved in making them- after all they are the ones that have to live with the marine protected areas, and they won’t work without their support. We have set up the Steering Group which will make recommendations to Government on the location of MCSZ for the south-west. They will also recommend what level of protection each MCZ should have i.e. which activities should be restricted in them. The Steering Group consists of over 40 people who represent commercial and recreational sea users, landowners, government agencies to name a few. You can see the full list of representatives here. We have also set up local groups in each county in the south-west to ensure that proposed MCZs have the local support and backing that they need to be successful.
We take very seriously your suggestion that we are being guarded in our approach. One of our key principles is to be open and transparent. All our Steering Group meeting reports are available on our website in the Resources section. Our latest Steering Group meeting (11th Feb) report will be added shortly. We also share all the data we are gethering with the public via our Interactive Map, unless the license does not allow us to publish this data. If you come to one of our drop-in days and meet our staff I think you will find that we are open, frank and honest in our approach. We are holding two more drop-in days in Cornwall and I hope you can make it to one of them. The details of all of our meetings are on our Events page.
Unfortunately we are still dealing with uncertainties and these are very frustrating not just for stakeholders but also for us. We understand that this is going to be uncomfortable at this stage in the process, but we also believe that it is right to engage people early on, before decisions have been made. Recreational anglers, divers, kayakers and spearfishermen are all represented on the Steering Group and will be part of making these important decisions.
Thank you.
