The UK’s Marine Management Organisation (MMO) has announced that the coast and seas from Dover to the River Dart in Devon will be the second area in England to benefit from marine planning.
Marine plans will inform and guide marine users and regulators, managing the sustainable development of marine industries, such as wind farms, shipping, marine aggregates and fishing, alongside the need to conserve and protect marine species and habitats and recognise leisure uses.
The marine economy is currently worth more than £47bn annually to the UK, and has the potential to increase significantly. The UK is the first country in the world to plan across all marine activities, for all its territorial waters, and the plan areas announced recently are two of the 10 in total to be delivered by the MMO in the next decade.
The MMO is accountable to the Secretary of State for the Environment, who will approve each plan for consultation and adoption. The views of all those with an interest in the South marine areas are vital to the plan making process, and the next step will be speaking to as many people as possible affected by these plans.
A guide on how to get involved will be published before planning officially starts in early 2013.
[mappress]
Press release, September 11, 2012; Image: marinemanagement