The CSO, through Ireland's Institute for SDGs (IIS), supports reporting on the Sustainable Development Goals.
Ireland currently has a Marine Protected Area (MPA) network of 10,420 Km2, which is 2.1% of its total maritime area of 488,762 Km2.
Of the 74 fish stocks of interest to Ireland, 35 were sustainably fished in 2021 (47%), an increase from 33 in 2020.
The European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF) supports activities investing in coastal and fishing communities and invests €5.7 billion across the European Union. In Ireland it is implemented under the Operational Programme for Ireland.
The EMFF and the Irish Government co-fund the Operational Programme for Ireland of €239.2 million.
Ireland’s goals for sustainable fisheries are supported through the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), which provides the framework for the long term conservation and sustainability of fish stocks in the waters around Ireland and beyond. The Control Regulation establishes an effective control system for ensuring compliance with the rules of the CFP and the IUU Regulation establishes a system to prevent, deter and eliminate illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing which threatens the very foundation of the CFP.
This new publication ‘Ireland's UN SDGs – Goal 14 Life Below Water 2021’, is the fourteenth in a series from the Central Statistics Office (CSO). These publications monitor and report on how Ireland is progressing towards meeting its targets under the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) from the United Nations (UN).
The CSO and Government Departments and Organisations collaborate to bring together data required in these reports for Ireland’s SDGs. This collaboration is formalised under the SDG Data Governance Board, which meets on a quarterly basis. The publication for Goal 14 was developed in collaboration with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) and the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS).
This fourteenth publication includes data for Ireland for each of the SDG indicators selected by the UN to measure 'Goal 14 Life Below Water'. Data is available at various levels of detail which include geography, gender, age group and other categories, where applicable.
This report on Goal 14 has ten indicators which are organised into 3 user friendly chapters:
The titles of these chapters are based around common themes in the ten targets which are measured in Goal 14.
All reports published in the series to date are on the CSO's SDG hub.
The 17 UN SDGs are a set of global development targets adopted by the United Nations (UN) member countries in September 2015 to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. The UN SDGs are driving the global development agenda towards 2030 (Agenda 2030). They address global challenges including those related to poverty, inequality, climate change, environmental degradation, peace and justice. The 17 goals are all interconnected, and in order to leave no one behind, the aim is to achieve them all by 2030. They recognise that ending poverty and other deprivations must go hand-in-hand with strategies that improve health and education, reduce inequality, and help economic growth, while tackling climate change and working to preserve our oceans and forests.
The Central Statistics Office (CSO), Ordnance Survey Ireland (OSi) and Environmental Systems Research Institute (Esri-Ireland) established a project team in April 2017 to engage with a combined UN Statistics Division (UNSD)/Esri research exercise with a goal to develop and deploy a new approach for monitoring the UN SDG Indicators using geographic information systems. The result of this exercise is a new website (Ireland's SDGs Data Hub), hosted on OSi's Geohive platform, which is Ireland’s Central Portal for all SDGs and contains indicators data on the 17 UN SDGs for Ireland. All the indicators in this publication will be loaded onto the Geohive. This work has been formalised through the creation of Ireland’s Institute for SDGs (IIS) - an initiative between the CSO, OSi and Department of Environment, Climate and Communications (DECC). The membership of the IIS is expected to expand with ongoing monitoring and reporting of Ireland's progress towards meeting UN SDGs.
Statistician's Comment
Commenting on the publication, Kevin McCormack, Senior Statistician, said:
“This new report, Goal 14 Life Below Water 2021, has data on ten indicators for Ireland, divided over three chapters: Management, Conservation and Policy. Data are presented in categories relevant to the indicators and geographical location, where possible. The SDGs and their associated indicators are, by design, wide-ranging in their coverage. As a result, the Irish data is provided by a number of sources including Government departments, official organisations and international organisations such as the UN. The publication for Goal 14 was developed in collaboration with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM) and the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) in the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage (DHLGH)."
Commenting on the findings of the publication, Kevin McCormack, Senior Statistician, said:
“Of the 74 fish stocks in Ireland, 35 were sustainably fished in 2021 (47%), an increase from 33 in 2020. The number of overfished stocks fell from 13 to 11 (15% of the total) over the same time period.
Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are marine areas that are protected and managed over the long term, with a primary objective of conserving habitats and/or species. Ireland currently has a Marine Protected Area (MPA) network of 10,420 Km2, which is 2.1% of its total maritime area of 488,762 Km2.
Ireland’s goals for sustainable fisheries are supported through the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). The CFP provides the framework for the long term conservation and sustainability of fish stocks around our shores and is designed to ensure the long term sustainability of fishing in the waters around Ireland and throughout EU waters. Compliance with the rules of the CFP is ensured under Council Regulation (EC) No 1224/2009 establishing a system of control, inspection, and enforcement. The prevention, deterrence and elimination of illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing is provided for under Council Regulation (EC) No 1005/2008. IUU fishing is a serious threat to sustainable fishing and jeopardises the very foundation of the CFP and international efforts to promote better ocean governance.
Ireland’s European and Maritime Fisheries Fund Operational Programme (EMFF) supports activities investing in coastal and fishing communities, and is implemented in Ireland under the Operational Programme for Ireland and invests €5.7 billion across the European Union to:
The Operational Programme for Ireland of €239.2 million is co-funded by the EMFF (€147.6m) and the Irish Government (€91.6m)."