Total spend with media agencies over the last five years (2019-2024) was £50,729,800.33, as published here Marketing spend - Marketing spend - gov.scot

Media planning and buying is placed by call-off from the Media Planning, Buying and Associated Services framework (Ref: SP-23-05). The work is competed through the Framework and tenders are evaluated for value and quality. Framework suppliers when bidding are required to provide full detailed costs against indicative volumes, using the price guarantees set under the Framework.

Where appropriate media spend is audited for value against the Framework pricing as well as quality by an independent media auditor on a six monthly basis.

The Scottish Government does not collect data on fish survival by calendar year. Each October, Scottish Government publishes a Scottish Fish Farm Production Survey which presents data on survival to harvest within a year class; that is, the fish grown to harvest within a production cycle.

The member may be interested to know that industry trade body Salmon Scotland publishes monthly mortality data. In recent correspondence to the Rural Affairs and Islands Committee dated 3 February 2025, Salmon Scotland noted that their data indicated survival across all marine farms was 82.3% in 2024, up 10 percentage points from 72.3% in 2023.

The Scottish Government received the following rental income from the agricultural and crofting tenancies £208,396.54 in 2020-21, £212,951.73 in 2021-22, £214,950.92 in 2022-23, £220,002.31 in 2023-24 and £220,147.55 in
2024-25.

NatureScot intends to have the report ready for external review by 31 March 2025 and will then send to Scottish Ministers for consideration once the external review has been completed.

The remit of the review includes assessing the potential to apply the principle of full cost recovery to species licensing and this will be included in the review report.

126 pedigree bulls are kept at the Scottish Government’s Knocknagael farm, near Inverness for the crofting cattle improvement scheme.

We do not hold information on the numbers and types of livestock owned and managed by our farm and croft tenants.

We assess the environmental impact of farming operations at Knocknagael through the use of Biodiversity and Carbon audits.

We do not hold information on the numbers of livestock owned and managed by our farm and croft tenants or assess any environmental impact of livestock farming on a tenant by tenant basis.

The information requested is not held centrally. Work has begun to routinely collect patient level data from all three hubs.

The Scottish Government does not have management control over the land it owns that is under secure agricultural or crofting tenure. Therefore, any decisions on land use change would be for our tenants to make, and the Scottish Government as their landlord would not obstruct them considering carrying out changes, such as peatland restoration or woodland creation.

The Scottish Government does not intend to publish the legal or other advice obtained by NatureScot regarding which areas of land should be covered by a 16AA licence under the Wildlife Management and Muirburn (Scotland) Act 2024.

It is for NatureScot to determine whether to publish this advice.

We are exploring a new long term conditions strategy to better recognise the fact that many people living with long term conditions need the same types of support and care, regardless of their condition.