Northern Ireland Marine Protected Areas: SAC, SPA, MCZ, and ASSI Designations

DAERA's official geospatial layer consolidates all designated Marine Protected Areas within Northern Ireland's marine planning extent. The dataset includes six distinct conservation designations—Special Areas of Conservation (SAC), Special Protection Areas (SPA), proposed SPAs, Ramsar sites, Marine Conservation Zones (MCZ), and Areas of Special Scientific Interest (ASSI)—with marine components in both inshore and offshore regions. Attribution fields describe each MPA's management authority and provide hyperlinks to detailed feature and management information.

Use Cases

• Marine spatial planning and impact assessment based on the consolidated MPA boundaries and designations.
• Conservation status monitoring and reporting based on the designated features (e.g., habitats, bird species).
• Regulatory compliance checking for development projects based on MPA location and management authority.
• Scientific research on MPA network effectiveness based on the merged geospatial layers from multiple sources.
• Public information and education based on the provided hyperlinks to detailed feature and management data.

Strengths

• Represents the official consolidated layer from the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA).
• Integrates six distinct legal designations (SAC, SPA, pSPA, Ramsar, MCZ, ASSI) into a single geospatial resource.
• Includes attribution for management authority and direct links to source information on protected features.

Limitations

• Metadata for row count, file size, and specific column schema is unavailable across all platform listings.
• A review of bird species protected under ASSI legislation was ongoing as of December 2020, indicating potential future changes.
• Platform metadata shows conflicts: one entry lists a last update of 2026-04-15, while others show null or no date.

Provenance

Source

Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) Features Database and DAERA websites.

Collection Method

Individual designation layers were re-projected to WGS84 and merged using ESRI ArcGIS data management tools.

Time Range

Snapshot as of December 2020, with a noted ongoing review.

Freshness

2026-04 15 14:20:16.957996 (from one platform entry); other entries list no date or reference a December 2020 review.

Geography

Northern Ireland's Marine Plan extent, including inshore and offshore regions.