Key facts
- In 2005 WWF published a Marine Health Check report to gauge the health of the UK’s sea life. This revealed that 13 out of 16 key marine species and habitats were in decline in UK waters.
- To date, estimates show that nearly a quarter of the UK’s sea bed has been affected by human actions such as trawling and other industrial activities.
- Currently, only around 2% of the UK’s sea area has any level of legal protection. There is only one UK No Take Zone (Lundy Island in the Bristol Channel) where fishermen have agreed to limit their activities to restore fish stocks and marine wildlife, and just three marine nature reserves (Skomer Island in Wales, Strangford Lough in Northern Ireland and Lundy Island in England) which provide legal protection from damaging activities.
- Maritime activities contribute around 5% of UK GDP in direct economic benefits. UK seas also provide many indirect benefits such as climate regulation, nutrient cycling, leisure and tourism.The number of key laws relating to the marine environment exceeds the 30 listed in WWF’s draft Marine Bill. In addition, a recent report by Cardiff University (in press) lists over 150 pieces of relevant maritime legislation.
- The UK government is committed to international agreements and laws to regulate marine activities and to protect wildlife. These include a commitment to achieve a reduction in biodiversity loss by 2010 (under the World Summit on Sustainable Development and the Convention on Biological Diversity). The UK aims to establish a network of protected areas by 2012. There are also several EU Directives relating to the protection of the marine environment; in particular, the Marine Strategy Directive requires the UK to achieve “good environmental status” in its seas by 2020.
- As part of the EU energy targets (which set out proposals to achieve a reduction in EU greenhouse gas emissions of 20% by 2020) the UK government has its own national target of generating 15% of energy from renewable sources. The seas provide significant opportunities for wind, wave and tidal energy generation – but development must be located sensitively to minimise damage to the marine environment.
