About this layer:This layer consists of all Marine Protected Areas that are designated within Northern Ireland’s marine area and include SAC, SPA, pSPA, Ramsar, MCZ and ASSI with marine components in both inshore and offshore regions. All polygons were re-projected from their respective projections to WGS84 then merged into a single layer using ArcGIS geoprocessing tools. Additional attribution was added to include information at each MPA of the following:Designated Features - Features identified for protection, the condition of these features and the Year condition was assessed.Management authority- responsible for the monitoring and management of the siteInshore & Offshore - Yes/No, some MPAs may have boundaries that span both areas.Area - km2More Information The designated features were extracted from DAERA Features Database, the authoritative source of protected features. It should be noted that a review of bird species protected under ASSI legislation is being undertaken by DAERA ornithologists and the species list may change after this review. Dec 2023What can you do with this layer?Visualisation: This layer can be used for visualisation online in web maps.Analysis: This layer can be used in DashboardsDownload: The data is downloadable.