Assessment of physical and pollution impacts on fisheries sector operations

Foreseen causes such as coastal engineering and unforeseen accidents such as shipping collisions or pollution can have serious impact on fishing, fish farming or fish processing enterprises.  They can lead to large and complex claims for compensation. 

Homarus Ltd can assist through a highly experienced and sensitive approach to technical and economic assessment of impacts and associated compensation issues.  Homarus Ltd staff have assessed losses to fisheries operations in over 90 impact cases around the world since 1990.  They have taken leading roles in fishery damage assessment in large incidents such as BRAER,  SEA EMPRESS and PRESTIGE oil spills and other high profile cases such as Factortame (Spanish fleet losses through registration legislation) and the Lincshore scheme (major coastal engineering works).  Please scroll this page for more details of services, or click on the links at left to navigate to summaries of experience in physical and pollution impact assessment.
   
Intervention can be immediately post-accident (see emergency contact details). Alternatively assistance can be given in analysis of losses at some later stage, for example after a fishing vessel repair period.

Homarus Ltd specialists all have experience in gathering evidence with which to build up a picture of the position of fishery enterprise(s) had the damage not occurred.  Our hands-on experience in fishing and fish farming gives a rapid understanding of the probable mechanisms and extent of any losses and can enhance exchange of information with claimants. 

Experience of large, high profile cases means the company is attuned to the need for robust compensation methodolgies that are transparent and can be uniformly applied across large numbers of impacted fishing vessels or aquaculture producers.  

The company has a large bank of reference material and expertise in rapidly sourcing other secondary information. The company also has a network of many fisheries specialists around the world who can often assist should particular geographical or technical knowledge is needed. 

The range of services covered in loss assessment covers:

• Technical assessment of impacts
• Liaison with claimants and authorities
• Sampling regimes
• Gathering and analysis of data
• Compensation strategy and methodology
• Determination of economic losses
• Compensation negotiations
• Support of legal teams
• Modelling alternative outcomes of incidents
• Pre-impact fisheries assessments

Assistance can range from a brief desk-based appraisal of technical merits of a small claim, to fielding a team on-site for investigations and assessment of multiple fisheries claims in large cases. 

These services are provided to shipowners, insurers, international, national and local governmental bodies, civil engineers and developers, law firms and the fishing and aquaculture industry.