Sustainably intensifying rural agricultural systems is now a development goal that has gained momentum in the recent decades due to a rapidly growing population and feeds directly into the Sustainable Development Goals of ending poverty and hunger. By 2050, the world will be inhabited by 10 billion people, 68% of whom will be city dwellers which will pose serious food and livelihoods security threats to millions of people, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Recent events around the world have revealed varying degrees of public support for climate change and environmental regulation. Applying a latent class logit model, this study investigates Norwegian and Scottish public’s economic support for proposed deep sea management policies for novel attributes, identifying the presence of preference heterogeneity. Marine litter and health of fish stocks were the attributes with the highest values in absolute terms. This was followed by the size of the protected area coverage, whilst the creation of jobs was the least valued.