Scottish Sea Farms staff set to clean up

Scottish Sea Farms is scaling up its involvement in the Great British Beach Clean, mobilising employees and their friends, families and local communities to tackle rubbish washed up on shore or left by beach users.

The event, taking place over September 17-26, is organised UK-wide by the Marine Conservation Society (MCS) and covers hundreds of beaches. Scottish Sea Farms is asking its staff – around 480 on Scotland’s west coast, Orkney and Shetland – to take part by helping to collect rubbish from a registered beach local to them.

This is the fourth year SSF has participated in the Beach Clean. Last year, because of Covid-19 restrictions the company was represented only by employees in “work bubbles”, but this year family members, friends and neighbours are also being invited to take part.

Each team of volunteers will be focusing on a 100 metre stretch of beach, removing litter and rubbish washed up on shore, and recording what they find to help MCS record the scale and source of the problem.

Ten Scottish Sea Farms beach clean coordinators have volunteered to oversee efforts in their communities: from Barcaldine, Eriboll, Kishorn, Mallaig, Mull, Oban, South Shian and the Summer Isles on the Scottish mainland, to the Orkney and Shetland Islands. Each coordinator is responsible for registering their local beach cleans, completing a survey of the litter collected and submitting the data to the MCS national database. They will also deliver safety briefings on the day and issue protective gloves and bags, as well as packed lunches, to all those involved.

Scottish Sea Farms Managing Director Jim Gallagher said: “We each, in our different ways, make our living from Scotland’s waters. We each care deeply about doing so as responsibly and sustainably as we can, as evidenced by the sheer range of greener initiatives underway across the business today. So to devote a few more hours of our time to help collect and remove rubbish from our local shorelines seems like the right and natural thing to do.

“The more of us that get involved, the greater the difference we can make, so we’re delighted to be able to welcome back family, friends and members of our local communities.”

Click here to find out more about the MCS Great British Beach Clean.