Effective management of the coastal zone depends on good knowledge of its resources and what affects them. The JNCC's Coastal Directories project, co-ordinated by JNCC on behalf of a wide-ranging funding consortium, collated extensive baseline environmental and human use information, including fisheries, for the coastal and nearshore marine zone of the whole of the UK, including Northern Ireland, the Isles of Scilly, Shetland, Orkney and the Isle of Man. The information is designed to meet the needs of planners and coastal zone managers and users. A disk set, in Adobe Acrobat format, is available to complement the book edition of most regional volumes and is supplied with free Windows-compatible reader software.