Fishing Impacts in Marine Protected Areas

The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs is managing the expansion and protection of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) against fishing and other extractive activities, with particular focus on banning seabed-damaging practices like bottom trawling within MPA boundaries and maintaining long-term monitoring programmes such as Lyme Bay. The policy is active and addresses both domestic MPA designation and international negotiations for Antarctic protection, though progress on Antarctic MPAs has been blocked by China and Russia despite scientific consensus.