Fish landings in Scotland in September 2025. A note by Tony Mackay, Economist tony@tonymackay.co.uk
- The Marine Management Organisation (MMO) have just published their monthly fish landings statistics for the UK for September 2025. The Scottish ones are set out below. The landings are by all UK and foreign vessels.
- Overall, the value of fish landings in Scotland was just over £35 million, which was -21% lower than in September 2024. There was a -27% fall in tonnage to 22,941. A very disappointing month.
- That was worse than the UK totals, which were a -16% fall in value and a -21% fall in tonnage. Scotland accounted for 63% of the UK value and 65% of the tonnage of fish landed.
- The value per tonne of fish landed in Scotland rose by +8.9% to £1,530 from £1,405 a year ago. The value was -2.9% lower than the UK average.
- Only two of the nine Scottish ports/districts recorded increases in value and 7 falls. Only 1 recorded a rise in tonnage and 8 declines. The value increases were in Scrabster (+7%) and Scalloway (+4%). The worst declines were in Other Scotland (-43%) and Cullivoe (-42%). The only tonnage increase was in Fraserburgh (+6%); and the worst declines in Cullivoe (-51%), Lerwick (-42%) and Kinlochbervie (-39%).
- Peterhead is by far the busiest fishing port in the UK, accounting for a massive 42% of the total Scottish value and 27% of the total UK value in September. The tonnage shares were 51% of the Scottish total and 33% of the UK. The port had a disappointing September, however, with a -11% fall in the value and -28% in the tonnage. Those falls had big impacts on the Scottish totals.
- Fraserburgh is the third busiest fishing harbour in Scotland and had a good month, with the value of landings only -1% lower and the tonnage +6% higher.
- It was also a good month for Scrabster, which has experienced a significant decline in fish landings so far this year. The September £2.4 million value of landings was +7% higher than in 2024, although the tonnage was -2% lower.
- In contrast, it was a very disappointing month for Lerwick, where the value of landings was down -28% to just under £5.2 million and the tonnage down -42% to 4,500.
- The other Shetland ports had a mixed month: landings were up in Scalloway but well down in Cullivoe.
- Kinlochbervie had a bad month, with a massive -25% fall in value and -39% in tonnage.
- Ullapool also had a bad month, with the value of landings down -34% and tonnage down -13%.
- The “Other Scotland” harbours and ports reported a huge -43% fall in value to £6.3 million and a -14% fall in tonnage to 2,700. I hope to publish some statistics soon on the various harbours which comprise “Other Scotland” when MMO make those available.
- I have added the monthly statistics for the first 9 months of 2025 from January to September. The overall total values of the fish landings for each port/harbour are:
The total value of fish landings in the 9 months to September was just over £386 million, which was +1.5% higher than in the same period of 2024.
The rankings of the % changes are:
- Ullapool +16.1%
- Peterhead +15.8%
- Lerwick +10.6%
- Fraserburgh +3.4%
- Scalloway -6.7%
- KInlochbervie -11.7%
- Cullivoe -11.8%
- Other Scotland -22.3%
- Scrabster -27.4%
Image: © Fish Focus