Economic Impacts of a Ban on Hunting with Dogs in Scotland.

Economic impact of a ban on mounted hunts

4.1 Direct impact on hunts and other suppliers in Scotland

A ban on hunting would produce a gross withdrawal of expenditure in Scotland by hunting households of £3.23m (excluding labour). From the survey of suppliers we were able to estimate the impact of this withdrawal on direct employment of the supplying businesses. Businesses were classified into 15 types and respondents asked both to estimate the impact of a hunting ban on their turnover and employment, and to provide information on overall turnover and employment. By assuming a constant coefficient linking turnover to employment the employment impact of a reduction in turnover from households consequent on a hunting ban was derived (Table 4.1). The expected short-term job losses were stated as 28.8 FTEs. Not surprisingly, the main impacts were on businesses closely linked to horses - farriers, and those employed in livery and horse sales. Some business sectors, which could be quite important in terms of household expenditures (e.g. professional services, builders, vehicle repairs and sales, veterinary surgeries), indicated that there would be no effects of a ban on their employment.

Table 4.1 Direct employment effects of a reduction in expenditure by subscriber house

^*source: Scottish 1996 Input-output table
⁺source: Direct survey estimate
†source: Consultant’s estimates

When the change in turnover resulting from the ban was converted to employment, using the ‘turnover per FTE’ coefficients estimated for each business type, the net impact was 55.6 FTE jobs. Again the main impacts are on farriers, horse sales and livery (Table 4.1). Although the suppliers indicated smaller immediate effects (30.3 FTEs), this estimate of 55.6 is preferred as a more precise indication of longer-term adjustment.

4.2 Indirect and induced impacts

The indirect and induced effects associated with a ban on hunting were estimated using input-output techniques. This involved three steps. First the expenditures of subscribing households and the hunts were reclassified into the 128 industry groups adopted in the 1996 Scottish Input-output tables. Second, a separate hunt "sector" was created in the tables using the information collected on hunt income and expenditures. Finally, the impact of both a reduction in subscribers’ expenditures and a change in hunt activity was modelled under the standard input-output assumptions of fixed cost structures and constant household expenditure patterns⁴.

As indicated in Table 4.2, the results suggest that in addition to the direct changes in employment following a ban, an additional 30 FTE jobs would be under threat in the economy. Of these, 16 are due to indirect effects (associated with a reduction in demand for intermediate inputs), and 14 due to induced effects (with a fall in income of employees reducing demand for Scottish goods and services). In both cases, these "knock-on" employment effects were spread evenly throughout the whole economy with no one sector disproportionately affected.

Table 4.2 Effect of a ban on indirect and induced employment (Scotland

4.3 Impact on farmers

The farmers in our sample said that the hunts had ridden over their properties, on average, 7- 8 times per year. Most farmers did not seem to be fully aware of how many foxes were killed on their land. Guesses given ranged from 2 -12 foxes killed each year. However, the two highest figures given for foxes killed would indicate more than one fox per hunt on the farmer’s own land, which implies that this may be an overestimate.

Most farmers did not find foxes a serious problem at current levels, but a few were concerned that numbers would increase without the hunt. Benefits of the hunt were seen to be dispersion and harassment of fox population, picking off weak or unhealthy foxes, and dealing with situations where a particular fox was causing a problem (because the hounds can pick up an individual fox’s scent). Generally though, farmers did not see the hunts as a significant factor in keeping fox numbers down.

Some of the farmers contacted also shoot foxes themselves, killing an average of 8 foxes per year. These farmers were less sure than others as to how many animals the hunts kill, presumably because they took on fox control themselves. This same group stated that they would simply shoot more often if there were no hunting. Nearly 60% of farmers interviewed currently had other people shooting on their land, such as keepers specifically keeping foxes under control, or shooting club/syndicates who shoot for sport but will also kill foxes. These farmers saw expansion of these control methods as the solution to a hunt ban and this would generally be at no, or little, extra cost to the farmers themselves. Other options mentioned were use of professional pest control, which would tend to incur a greater cost. The overall conclusion was that a ban on mounted hunts would have a very limited impact on farm costs or output. The minor expenditure and employment impacts⁵ on farm businesses were therefore ignored.

4.4 Impacts in the Borders

Because of the geographical concentration of hunts, the impact of a ban will be greatest in the three previous administrative districts in the Borders - Berwickshire, Roxburgh, and Ettrick and Lauderdale (See Figure 1.1). This region has five of the ten hunts and 132 (37%) of the Scottish households, which subscribe to hunts.

If hunt subscribers in the Borders are typical of those in Scotland as a whole, then 37% of the Scottish expenditure and employment effects due to adjustment of household activities will be located in the Borders⁶. This amounts to a reduction in household expenditure in Scotland of £1.39m, and a loss of household employment of 27-31 FTEs.

There are five hunts located in the Borders and these employed nine full-time and five part-time staff. All would be made redundant with a loss of 10 FTE jobs.

Not all of the expenditure of Borders households will be with local suppliers, and Borders suppliers will receive income from subscribers resident elsewhere in Scotland. We identified that 33% (£1.07m) of the fall in the spending on Scottish businesses following a ban (£3.23, Table 2.7) was directed at businesses in the Borders. We can thus deduce that the direct employment effect on suppliers is likely to be the same proportion of the Scottish effect - 10 FTEs in the short-term, with a longer-term adjustment of 18 FTEs.

The total direct impact of the Bill would be to lose 55-59 FTE jobs. It was not possible to estimate the indirect and induced impacts in the Borders because there are no regional input-output tables. However, in broad terms, total job losses are likely to around 60-65 FTEs.