Charting Progress 2: UK Marine Assessment Reporting Regions

Charting Progress 2 Reporting Regions are a geospatial dataset defining eight marine assessment areas for UK waters, originally developed in 2009 and updated in 2025. The dataset was created by the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC) to assess human pressures and marine productivity. It continues to be used for designating Marine Protected Areas and aggregating ecological sensitivity information.

Use Cases

• Designating Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) based on defined regional biogeographic boundaries.
• Aggregating marine biotope sensitivity information for environmental impact assessments within specific reporting regions.
• Selecting Highly Protected Marine Areas (HPMAs) using the established regional framework.
• Developing indicators for the ecological status of the water environment based on regional assessments.

Strengths

• Dataset was updated in 2025 to align boundaries with the UK Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and UK Continental Shelf limits.
• Regional framework has been used for over a decade, informing a variety of official marine assessment and reporting purposes.
• Boundaries were originally developed based on physical and biological biogeography from the 2004 Review of Marine Nature Conservation.

Limitations

• The coastline data used in a 2022 update was of medium spatial resolution, lacking detail in complex areas like sea lochs and islets.
• Part of the boundary for the Scottish Continental Shelf region has not been updated since 2009 and remains aligned with an older territorial waters limit.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.

Provenance

Source

Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC)

Collection Method

Boundaries were developed by adapting 'regional seas' identified by the Review of Marine Nature Conservation (RMNC) 2004.

Time Range

Boundaries originally created in 2009, with updates in 2022 and 2025.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-14 09:48:18.476165; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Covers UK waters, including the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), Continental Shelf, and Isle of Man Territorial Sea.