Conor D McGuinness: Can MPAs and Fishers Co-manage Our Seas?

I have a number of questions, and I'll put the first set of questions are for you, Ms Bramley. You mentioned the MPAs in Italy and France, and indeed the Portuguese model. I'm really interested, particularly in the objectives of the one in Italy that you mentioned, about biodiversity, certainly at its core, but also about education and about sustainable fishing. How has that worked out in terms of the process of putting the MPA in place, but in terms of its management as well and ensuring that there is sustainable fishing in that one? Are there similar examples in either France or Portugal? Please, thank you. Yes, my understanding from the Italy example is that the fisheries have been involved from the very beginning in setting the regulations for the fisheries, and the manager spoke at an event where he was presented with an award by the European Commission, which MPA Europe Project was a judge for, and I remember that he commented on the active presence there day in, day out. This had been achieved not as a sort of a big bang or a sudden enlightenment, but through steady day-to-day work from the marine protected area staff, where fisheries representatives could come by the office, talk through an issue, and then the work was worked through together. So, my understanding about MPA is that it's been the success that it's evidencing today in terms of more profitable fisheries, looking at expansion, significant expansion, spillovers and ecological recovery is down to that very strong partnership that's been set and the tone that's been set with fisheries organizations right from the very beginning. And I think the same can be said of the Isle of Man example, where if you look at the videos that I provided a link to in my evidence, it's very clear that this has been the fruits of a partnership initiated, I think, more by the fisheries directorate within the marine environment ministry, and some of the marine protected areas have arisen from fisheries restricted areas. So, this again demonstrates an openness to adapt to be opportunistic almost about designation and management of marine protected areas based on existing practices that might already be contributing to marine protection. So, I think both those examples are worth a closer look in terms of the partnerships, the very equal footing partnerships that have been established from the beginning and the learning by doing as they've gone along. And just speaking to monitoring, actually, again on the Isle of Man example, they have a very nice monitoring system in place for all the local fishers so that as soon as the fishers return with the catch, they've logged not only where they were fishing very precisely on a map-based app, but they can report what's been caught and that is interactively fed into the fisheries management day by day. So, they have monitoring in place for all the vessels and are able to adaptively manage the fishery very tightly in that example. I think with Portugal, it's still unfolding. The example I gave with the Azores MPA, it's very much at the designation stage. So, this is an unfolding story of how the partnership is working with the fisheries. Thank you. And you led on nicely to what my second question was going to be in terms of the framework for performance analysis and monitoring and what works. And you've mentioned the Isle of Man. Are there lessons to take, notwithstanding it's maybe too early to tell in Portugal, but are there lessons to take from Italy and France in terms of that performance analysis monitoring on an ongoing basis? Yes, I think the videos that the Isle of Man have produced as part of their biosphere recognition are really illuminating. Evidence is presented of ecological recovery and spillover and of fisheries outcomes too. And the comment is made that it's essential to keep showing that the MPA is doing what it was intended to do to maintain that public trust, to justify the closure of these areas and to keep the community engagement positive and to ensure the community continues to recognize the value of these places. And as George has said, and perhaps in an island community, that's a more strongly felt natural imperative than on the south coast of England where we don't have strong ocean literacy. Another thing I would add is that the performance analysis needs to reflect the objectives of the MPA. So, the objectives could be simply this narrow feature-based approach or there can be the wider ecosystem and they could be therefore relating to fisheries, education, research, but climate increasingly. And the Isle of Man Marine Protected Area Network is now considering how to use newly gathered information on blue carbon across the inshore area, some of the inshore area of the island to understand how that can feed into either newly designated protected areas or stronger protections or fisheries management measures so that seabed sediment impacts are mitigated. So, there's an example where they're continuing to adapt and experiment and improve management on a sort of continuous spectrum. Thank you, Ms. Bramley. Ms. Short, we've heard about the impact on sea fisheries, but is there any experience in Sussex or that you're aware of interaction with aquaculture, be that shellfish, finfish, seaweed, where there's been negative impact, positive impact, neutral? We don't have any examples locally of aquaculture. There are areas in other areas of the English waters that they do have aquaculture either very close to. I'm not aware of any that they have them within marine protected areas, if I'm honest. But I think where they do exist, probably one learning is to make sure that the benefits for biodiversity and carbon sequestration that are claimed from the aquaculture facilities are long-term and evidence-based. Because a lot of cases, information from those is claiming very short-term benefits, which are then fed into protections or licensing. So, that would be a consideration is how long-term are any carbon or biodiversity benefits of any aquaculture facilities, if they're going to be implemented at all, but also definitely if they're in a marine protected area. Thank you. And I might put that same question to you in a moment, Ms Bromley, but just as short, the co-management of fisheries, I suppose, allied with that analysis and monitoring, but you mentioned the involvement of fishing operators in research. How was that? Is that kind of a formal structure? Is it done informally? Can you speak just more about the impact that that has had on the fishing industry locally, in terms of the economic benefits or otherwise? And are you aware of similar happening in other areas where there are MPAs? So, the mechanism with which that exists locally is through the Fisheries Management Organisation. We are able to create those relationships. And that's really because they are so physically present in the protected area, because they have that enforcement vessel. The members of staff that work for the Fisheries Management Organisation are able, and they have relationships, and that's a really key learning is those kind of on-the-ground relationships. They are boarding their vessels every day. They have those interpersonal relationships. And so, there's that level of trust. So, we are able to organise our monitoring on those vessels with those fishers, because they have that level of trust with those specific staff at the Fisheries Management, who they know and see on a daily basis. What I would say from that process is that there is a reluctance within some members of the fishing community, specifically if their gear type has been impacted by the protection, to trust or work with Fisheries Management or conservation organisations or even researchers. And for that reason, there needs to be adequate safeguarding and support for fishers that do work with those organisations. The fishing community can even become violent at times, and we've seen threats of that in our area and other areas in English waters, towards either Fisheries Management, other fishers or conservationists. So, it's a really key consideration is how to safeguard those fishers that are being involved in that process as well. Thank you. Ms Bramley, that question I put to Ms Short earlier, just in terms of any experience of the interaction of MPAs with aquaculture in your experience or your knowledge. Thank you. So, I'm aware, speaking of what's called regenerative aquaculture, so cultivation of seaweeds and shellfish is starting to increase around the UK. And I'm aware that a mussel farm off the south coast of the UK recently was found to have created a mussel bed beneath the farm, which was attracting biodiversity. So, there can be positive benefits from regenerative aquaculture, and it could be that that could be relevant to MPAs. For example, where water quality is a problem, and we have problems with our water quality in the UK, in that shellfish species can clean up nitrogen pollution and other forms of pollution. So, reefs can mitigate some of those issues, and we've lost a lot of our shellfish reefs around the UK. But they need to be, I would say, in the right places and not perhaps, you know, and they need to have social acceptance from the community. I am aware anecdotally of concerns in Scotland about aquaculture farms, commercial aquaculture farms, being located in close proximity to designated protected areas, where coastal communities are active at those areas. I don't have any specific details I can give to you other than we've heard this expressed. And this is where monitoring is really important, but is sorely lacking in the UK due to lack of resources. So, we have insufficient monitoring going on in our marine protected area networks in England and in Scotland. And therefore, and water quality monitoring in particular is lacking. So, there's no evidence to necessarily mitigate against those aquaculture farms, but they're certainly of concern to some coastal communities in Scotland. Thank you both very much for those very comprehensive and interesting responses. Thank you.