30 Jun 2026

Photo by Valentina Kondrasyuk   A new report has warned that marine conservation careers in Wales are becoming increasingly difficult to access for young people from working-class backgrounds, with a severe shortage of entry-level roles compounded by the complete absence of local vocational routes into the sector. Improving Social Mobility within Wales’s Marine Conservation Sector, published […]

30 Jun 2026

Photo by Paul Einerhand   The Marine Management Organisation (MMO) has confirmed it will publish a new dataset linking UK fishing landings to the exact locations where they were caught, in a pre-announcement covering the 2024 data year. The dataset, named the Landings Enriched Approach for Positional FISHeries data, or LEAPFISH, is provisionally due for release […]

30 Jun 2026

Photo by Paolo Chiabrando   Western Isles councillors have formally objected to a proposed 60-turbine offshore wind farm off the west coast of Lewis, after planning officers recommended opposition on the grounds of landscape, seascape and historic environment harm. The decision was taken at a full meeting of Comhairle nan Eilean Siar on 29 June, […]

30 Jun 2026

Photo by Theirry Meier   A new umbrella body, Marine Science UK (MSUK), has been launched to bring UK universities and research organisations together under a single voice, with the aim of feeding more coherent scientific evidence into government and industry decision-making on the ocean. A single voice for a fragmented sector According to its own description, […]

30 Jun 2026

Photo by Markus Spiske   Greenpeace UK has announced plans to create new underwater boulder barriers in UK Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), a decade after the Brexit vote and five years after the Fisheries Act 2020 gave ministers full powers to protect them. As Afloat.ie reported, the charity argues those powers have gone largely unused, with destructive industrial […]

23 Jun 2026

Photo by Thimo van Leeuwen   Scottish Ministers have been both non-compliant with, and ineffective in implementing, their legal duties to protect and restore the seafloor, according to a new report published on 23 June by Environmental Standards Scotland (ESS), the independent body that monitors environmental law in Scotland. The findings landed on the same day campaigners […]

23 Jun 2026

Photo by Denys Nevozhai   The UK has committed £13.9 million to international programmes tackling ocean protection, coastal resilience and plastic pollution, with Marine Minister Emma Hardy announcing the funding at the eleventh Our Ocean Conference in Mombasa, Kenya. The money is channelled through the Blue Planet Fund, the UK’s flagship ocean financing vehicle, which marks its fifth anniversary this […]

23 Jun 2026

  Photo by Paul Einerhand   Global fisheries and aquaculture production hit a record high in 2024, even as the share of the world’s fish stocks classed as biologically sustainable fell for the second report running, according to The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture 2026 (SOFIA 2026), the Food and Agriculture Organization’s flagship biennial assessment. The […]