Orkney Marine Planning Update
Summer 2022
Introduction
Since our last update in Spring 2022, Orkney Islands Council’s marine team have been out and about, meeting people around the islands to talk about the proposed marine plan. As part of this work, you may have noticed our new logo (top right), which we will use on all our publications from now on. It was first used on the new banners we have printed for our public engagement events (see below).
New Chair and Vice Chair of OMPAG
Following on from the recent elections, Cllrs David Dawson and Gillian Skuse are the new Chair and Vice Chair respectively of the Orkney Marine Planning Advisory Group (OMPAG). We will arrange a briefing session to provide them with information on the status of the advisory group and look forward to working with them is this capacity.
Islanders’ Know Their Marine Environment
The Council’s Marine Planning team has completed the first phase of island visits to discuss marine planning in Orkney. Between mid April and early May 2022, the team visited Stronsay, Hoy, Sanday and Westray, holding two public sessions on each island. The team also visited schools to help pupils learn about marine issues and to hear the views of young people. These sessions demonstrated just how much the children know about their islands and their extensive marine life and maritime activities. 70 children and about 25 adults participated in lively discussions about how many eyes a scallop has (up to 200!), to issues on marine litter and fishing.
IMAGE: A person in diving equipment explores the underwater wreck of the B98 near Sanday. The image caption reads: “Danny explores the B98, Sanday”.
The Council are in the early stages of preparing the Orkney regional marine plan with support from an advisory group representing community, environmental, economic and recreational interests. The plan will contain local policies to support decision making in areas from aquaculture to harbours to marine biodiversity, to name a few.
The recent visits helped local communities to gain an understanding of Orkney’s regional marine plan-making process before the plan goes out to public consultation around summer 2023. It was also an opportunity to find out more about the Orkney Coastal and Marine Recreation Survey, which was undertaken in May - June to inform the plan (see below).
Shona Turnbull, Marine Planner, said: “The knowledge and enthusiasm of the island communities has really helped us understand island marine issues. We would like to thank everyone for taking the time to speak to us and we look forward to continuing these discussions as we take forward Orkney’s marine plan”.
In person drop-in events were also then undertaken in St Margaret’s Hope, Stromness and Kirkwall in late June/early July. These led to some useful discussions on the purpose of the plan and its role within wider marine planning.
IMAGE: A marine planning drop-in event is taking place, with a presenter beside display boards and several people seated and taking notes. Legible text on the display boards includes: “What is marine planning?”, “What’s special about Orkney’s marine environment?”, “Orkney’s marine economy”, “Marine litter”, “Seagrass”, “Seabirds”, “Commercial Fishing”, and “Aquaculture”.
Recreational Activities Survey
The marine and coastal recreational survey has now closed. Over 300 respondents marked 571 important areas for their activities and dropped 347 pins on the facilities they use or would like to see. Work has now begun to analyse the information. The initial phase of analysis will produce recreational activity location maps for the regional marine plan, before phase two will look deeper into the facilities used, new facilities suggested and areas for improvement based on the comments.
If you forgot to fill out the survey on behalf of a club or business, it’s not too late to let us know at: marine.planning@orkney.gov.uk.
Thank you to everybody who took the time to fill out the survey, we are looking forward to sharing the results once available.
IMAGE: A map of the Orkney Islands and surrounding waters shows 347 green star-shaped pins marking facilities used for, or proposed for, marine and coastal recreation. The map labels include “The North Sound”, “Orkney Islands”, “Westray Firth”, “Mainland”, “Scapa Flow”, and “Pentland Firth”. The caption reads: “347 pins mark the facilities you use for marine and coastal recreation, as well as new facilities you would like to see.”
Current progress with marine plan
In amongst all the public engagement events outlined above, we are also busy working on the draft plan over this summer. Alongside it, we are also preparing a variety of accompanying technical documents such as the:
- Strategic Environmental Assessment;
- Habitats Regulations Assessment;
- Islands Communities Impact Assessment;
- Business Regulatory Impact Assessment;
- Equalities Impact Assessment;
- Children’s’ Rights and Welfare Impact Assessment.
Yes, that’s a lot of assessments! These draft documents will also form part of the public consultation documents when we consult on the draft regional marine plan next year.
Wider Ocean and Climate Change Literacy: free resources
To provide practical resources to anyone interested in ocean and climate literacy, a number of resources have been developed by the American based National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. These are free to download and may be a useful teaching aid. Details can be found in this link: Ocean and Climate Literacy (noaa.gov)
Note: detailed exploration of these resources has not been carried out by OIC and are therefore not directly endorsed by OIC, but as the source is the NOAA, it is likely to be considered reliable information https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/welcome.html
Contact us
As always, if you have any queries, do not hesitate to contact us.
Email Address: Marine.planning@orkney.gov.uk
Website: https://www.orkney.gov.uk/Service-Directory/D/marine-planning.htm
IMAGE: Three people in wetsuits stand together at the seashore, wearing snorkelling equipment and holding diving or snorkelling gear.