Question reference: S6W-15883
- Date lodged: 10 March 2023
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Current status: Answered by Mairi Gougeon on 17 March 2023
Question
To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to reflect the urgency of climate (a) mitigation and (b) adaptation in the final versions of Scotland’s Fisheries Management Plans.
Answer
Fisheries Management Plans (FMPs) are being developed by the Scottish Government in line with the Fisheries Act 2020, and will be published by the end of 2024, as set out in the Joint Fisheries Statement. The 21 Scottish-led FMPs will reflect the urgency of climate mitigation by outlining the policies the Scottish Government is developing to ensure sustainable fisheries. These policies include measures to reduce bycatch and entanglement, such as the Future Catching Policy.
FMPs will also be an important tool for climate adaptation, because FMPs will state the maximum sustainable yield for a stock, where this is available, and include an overview of the health and location of a stock over time. FMPs will be revisited at least every six years, which will support management of our fish stocks as the marine environment changes.
The development of the FMPs will include discussions with our core stakeholder Fisheries Management and Conservation (FMAC) Group. We will also be addressing climate change from a fisheries perspective through the FMAC Climate Change Subgroup and we aim to develop a work programme in partnership with concrete actions for the industry, the Scottish Government, academia and others to take in order to mitigate the impacts fishing has on climate change .