Friday 8 October 2021

Scottish government announces £650k for salmon conservation

The Scottish government has announced £650,000 of funding to support salmon conservation.

The funding will go towards expanding the salmon counter network to provide more information to monitor salmon populations and adds to the £550,000 already announced earlier this month to support wild salmon conservation.

The government looks to make fish farm containment measures and regulations more robust and introduce financial penalties for fish farm escapes.

This is to prevent wild fish from sea lice that are carried from fish farms and can damage wild populations.

Mairi Gougeon, Rural Affairs Secretary, commented: “The funding and broad programme of work announced today demonstrates that we have moved beyond the status quo and shows our commitment to improving the scientific evidence base.

“It underlines the importance of supporting a sector which provides a low carbon source of protein enjoyed nationally and internationally, while sustaining well paid jobs in some of our most fragile rural communities.

“It is vital the developing aquaculture sector is sustainable, that is why I launched an independent review of the aquaculture regulatory framework in August which will report in due course, while the Wild Salmon Strategy will be published by the end of December, in addition to announcing these measures today.”