RAC QLD: Queensland Seafood Marketing Symposium
Although a $2.7 billion industry,the Australian Seafood lags behind otherp rimary producers in its ability to centrally organise, market and represent itself to consumers,regulators and the general public.
There remains a strong need for seafood producers (fishers and farmers) to understand the curren seafood market, supply chainand advances in product development and marketing.
A marketing symposium would provide industry with an update on the current trends and approaches, it would further benefit industry by benefit industry by:
1. Informing participants how effective marketing works
2. Inspiring participants with practical examples of effective marketing they could apply at a sector, category or company level.
3. Showcase examples of effective marketing for domestic demand, export, trade and industry goodwill
4. Identify and explain new marketing channels and the opportunities they present
5. Demonstrating how to incorporate a systematic approach to developing a brand
6. Identifying meaningful and distinct consumer markets through market segmentation
It is clear that the priority audience for the symposium are fishers and farmers looking to improve their profitabulity
Final report
The initial proposal to hold a marketing symposium in Queensland was based on the need to bring Industry together with particular reference to the post-harvest sector to provide, exchange and discuss information in an open forum regarding trends and/or needs in the existing value chain process which will lead to product reaching its market in ultimate post-harvest condition and value. Concepts of market brands, brand orientation, consumer trends, market segmentation, packaging and distribution were all key elements of the symposium subject matter.
One of the key messages that resonated strongly throughout the symposium was that as an industry, we don’t communicate with consumers or the community in general about how sustainable Queensland Seafood is or its value in terms of nutrition and wholesomeness. Similarly, the sustainability message of how our industry operates is also absent in our marketing.
There was a strong consensus amongst the delegates that these areas should be addressed, and that perhaps the central theme of the next symposium should be what effective strategies and methods should we as an Industry consider in engaging and creating awareness within the community as to our high level of sustainable practice and social responsibility.
Trials of oceanographic data collection on commercial fishing vessels in SE Australia
Australia’s fisheries span a large area of ocean. Australia has the world’s third largest Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), with an area of over 8 million km2. This zone contains mainly Commonwealth managed fisheries, with State jurisdictions mainly in coastal waters up to the 3 nautical mile limit. Australia's total wild-catch fisheries gross value of production is $1.6 billion, of which 28% is from Commonwealth fisheries and 72% from the smaller coastal inshore fisheries managed by state jurisdictions. The wildcatch fisheries sector employs about 10,000 people across Australia (https://www.awe.gov.au/abares/research-topics/fisheries/fisheries-and-aquaculture-statistics/employment).
The commercial fishing industry has a network of thousands of vessels working mainly in inshore waters around Australia. They can supply a potential platform for extensive and fine scale spatial and temporal monitoring of the waters of the continental shelf (0-1200m), from the surface to the ocean floor. Given that their livelihoods depend on it, they have a keen understanding of oceanographic conditions with respect to fish behaviour, feeding and spawning and the various oceanographic factors that may influence this. In some fisheries (e.g. surface tuna longlining), fishers eagerly seek and use readily available fine-scale oceanographic data such as sea surface temperature and sea level, to improve their targeting and achieve higher resultant catch rates. For many other fisheries, however, it is the fine-scale sub-surface oceanographic conditions (feed layers, thermoclines, temperature at depth etc) that have a critical influence on their fishing dynamics. Unfortunately, this type of oceanographic data is far less readily available. Although fishers and scientists know these factors are important, the time series of fine scale spatial and temporal data relevant to fishery operations is not available to include in stock assessments. As a result, it is often assumed that variations in catch rates reflect changing stock abundance, when it may simply be a result of changing oceanographic conditions.
Marine scientists collect a vast range of oceanographic data using satellites, subsurface drones, and static and drifting buoys. Sea surface data, however, is much easier and more cost-effective to collect at high spatial and temporal resolutions than sub-surface data. Hence, understanding of sub-surface oceanographic conditions tends to be derived from modelling more than actual measurement. This may be sufficient at a wide-scale global or continental level, but it is not adequate at the fine-scale spatial and temporal resolution required for fisheries management.
The use of commercial fishing gear as a research data platform has been increasing in popularity internationally (https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2020.485512/full). A number of groups in Europe have been doing this for a decade (e.g Martinelli et al 2016), and New Zealand are also now involved (https://www.moanaproject.org/te-tiro-moana). However, this approach has yet to be implemented in Australia in a coordinated way. In particular, our approach dictates open access data served through the IMOS Australian Ocean Data Network (www.aodn.org.au) that can be collected once and used many times.
In this project we intend to instrument seafood sector assets (e.g Trawl Nets, longlines, pots) with fit-for- purpose quality-controlled (QC'd) temperature/pressure sensors to increase the sub-surface temperature data coverage around Australia’s shelf and upper slope regions (0-800m) at low cost. Not only will this assist in the collection of data at relevant spatial and temporal scales for use by fishers, but it will also provide a far more extensive level of QC’d data to oceanographers in near real time (NRT) for evaluation and ingestion into data-assimilating coastal models that will provide improved analysis and forecasts of oceanic conditions. In turn, this will also be of value to the fishing sector when used to standardise stock assessments.
Martinelli, M., Guicciardi, S., Penna, P., Belardinelli, A., Croci, C., Domenichetti, F., et al. (2016). Evaluation of the oceanographic measurement accuracy of different commercial sensors to be used on fishing gears. Ocean Eng. 111, 22–33. doi: 10.1016/J.OCEANENG.2015.10.037