About this Guide

- Special Area of Conservation (SAC): Protected wildlife conservation areas, considered to be important on a European as well as Irish level.

- Swim with Programmes: A practice in which a person or group of people attempt to enter the water to swim within visible range of a cetacean. This can be in the wild or in a captive environment.

ABOUT THIS GUIDE:

Ireland is an island nation situated in the Northeast Atlantic with a growing ecotourism industry. Among the Atlantic islands region cetacean watching and marine tourism sector, fail to achieve the mandatory requirements to qualify as sustainable ecotourism. In the Atlantic islands area, approximately 1.7 million people a year go whale watching, with a total expenditure of €119 million. In this region, approximately 90 existing marine protected areas (MPAs) where cetaceans are present and the 59 proposed MPAs represent nearly 27 per cent of all MPAs with cetaceans worldwide. When cetacean watching is carried out in a sustainable manner, especially in or near a cetacean MPA, with regulations in place, it has the potential to take a leading role in the development of an island-based ecotourism industry. Yet few MPAs have management plans that include strategies for sustainable ecotourism, which firstly depends on the maintenance of a pristine marine environment. Implementing a cost benefit analysis approach (CBA), underpins a framework for sustainable ecotourism that involves a stakeholder-agreed management plan, a legal structure, such as an MPA or Special Area of Conservation (SAC), coupled with environmental legislation and a strategy for evaluating sustainability that includes periodic review. The management plan should also set a carrying capacity for ecotourism (Hoyt, 2005).

In Ireland, marine mammal species, seals and cetaceans are protected under the 1992 EC Habitats Directive as transposed by the European Communities (Birds and Natural Habitats) Regulations 2011 (S.I. No. 477 of 2011) which required they are maintained at favourable conservation status. Thus, under Article 12 of the Directive, all cetaceans should receive strict protection within the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). Under Article 4 of the Directive, Special Areas of Conservation (SACs) must be proposed for the following species: Bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus), Harbour porpoise (Phocoena phocoena), grey seal (Halichoerus grypus) and harbour seal (Phoca vitulina). Under the Wildlife Acts 1976 to 2018, all cetaceans and seals are protected species listed on the 5th Schedule. Under this Act, Natural Heritage Areas (NHAs) may be established to protect habitats or species.