About us

By using experienced skippers as fisheries liaison officers and where necessary at particularly hazardous sites, fishing vessels as guard boats, effective communications could be maintained between the developer and the various forms of fishing and other marine traffic in the area. Over time this collaborative arrangement has been demonstrated as an extremely effective means of reducing frictions between other offshore sectors and the fishing industry during the development and construction phase of offshore development.

All NFFO Services guard vessels and chase boats are certificated by the Marine & Coastguard Agency (MCA)

The savings in disrupted operations and damaged fishing gear and subsea equipment have been incalculable, not to mention the primary objective of preventing loss of life and/or injury

It is testimony to the success of this collaborative approach that despite the massive scale of offshore developments in the North Sea and later the Irish Sea, the areas of direct conflict between the two industries over 25 years have been minimal.

As we move into an era characterised by marine spatial planning, there is tremendous value in learning from best practice and the success of the liaison arrangements between the oil and gas and fishing industry sets an example for other offshore sectors to follow.

The income generated through contracts awarded to NFFO Services has provided many fishing vessels with a welcome boost during difficult periods when they would otherwise be disrupted or displaced.

Agreed commission payable to NFFO by the guard vessel owners has also allowed the NFFO establish a charity, in the form of the NFFO Training Trust which helps new generations of fishermen achieve appropriate industry certification. Also over time, the liaison officers and guardship skippers have developed considerable expertise and professionalism in establishing effective liaison and communication built from their knowledge of the fishing industry.

Note: Variations in vessel description on this page have been deliberately included (eg; guard vessel, guard ship, guard boat etc) to apply variation in the meta-tags in line with different terminology used at various at times