ENVIRONMENTAL groups have warned of major impacts on Scotland's marine habitats and species from climate change in the wake of a new report.
According to the study by more than 150 Government and university scientists, global warming could cut commercial fish catches around Scotland by 20% while they increase by 10% around the south of England.
Gradually rising temperatures caused by climate pollution could drive porpoises, whales and dolphins away from Scotland's shores, it says, and the sea will become increasingly acidic, which could harm marine wildlife.
The Marine Climate Change Impacts Partnership has released its report card for 2013. It summarises the latest research from 55 UK science organisations including Scottish Natural Heritage, Marine Scotland and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency.
"This is a worrying report and confirms that major changes are coming for Scotland's marine environment, with water temperatures and acidity rising, and important fish stocks and wildlife on the move," said WWF Scotland director Lang Banks.
The fishing industry commended the study, but sounded caution. Paul Williams, chief executive of industry body Seafish, noted the report showed low confidence in its conclusions, but added: "Nonetheless it is important to understand any potential scenarios as clearly as possible, and having worked with many of the contributors to this report on a range of environmental issues over the years, we'd be keen to engage on behalf of the seafood industry."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article