Project Search

15 results

PROJECT NUMBER • 2023-156

PROJECT STATUS:

CURRENT

Northern Territory Aquaculture Research, Development and Extension Workshop 2024 and supporting Aboriginal partner attendance

The workshop aimed to unite the NT aquaculture sector and research organisations to develop a cohesive RD&E strategy. Specific objectives included discussing NT aquaculture priorities, challenges, and opportunities; facilitating knowledge sharing on current RD&E activities; strengthening...

ORGANISATION:

Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (NT)

TAGS

SPECIES

Fish LIGHT - Low impact gears and innovative harvest technologies

Project number: 2023-154

Project Status:

Current

Budget expenditure: $9,050,000.00

Principal Investigator: Samuel M. Williams

Organisation: Department of Primary Industries (QLD)

Project start/end date: 10 Mar 2024 - 19 Jun 2030

Contact:

FRDC

TAGS

Threatened Endangered Protected Species

SPECIES

Need

This program of works supports the trial, implementation, and evaluation of innovative and alternative low-impact harvest technologies (fishing gears) within Queensland’s inshore fisheries (East Coast and Gulf of Carpentaria). The program will be developed in a way that supports an evidence-based approach to developing and trialling sustainable alternative commercial fishing gears, and be run in collaboration with relevant Government agencies and fisheries stakeholders.

Through the additional support of co-investment of $4.5 million by FRDC (in line with this application and the approved funds listed under project 2023-154), the program will be delivered in two stages across a six-year timeframe (up to a total investment of $9 million).

The fishing methods to be trialled as part of the first stage will range from exploring enhancements of existing low-impact gear types, through to trials of innovative harvest technologies. The alternative low-impact harvest technologies will first be trialled in order to demonstrate their triple bottom line credentials. After this, the second stage will support broader implementation and evaluation of commercial application over a three-year period.

The program of works will also explore additional opportunities to enhance the economic value and social profile of the fishery, to ensure that any new harvest technologies align with global best practice standards, product value adding to enhance profitability margins, and improvements in social acceptability.

Wild caught seafood also allows for a diverse mix of species that appeal to a range of consumers and seafood businesses. It is planned that this work will explore potential opportunities for market expansion.

Objectives

1. Undertake gear trials with clear monitoring and assessment of gear performance against economic, ecological (including SOCI interactions) and social indicators.

2. Evaluate different gear trial pathways to understand the cost benefit trade-offs, timeframes and identify principles for success

3. Identify attitudinal, behavioural, and contextual factors affecting the adoption and perception of the alternative gear, and design and implement interventions to alleviate this.

4. Support developmental fishery implementation and optimisation of gears and business models to ensure long-term sustainability.

5. Understand the market and consumer preferences associated with caught combination of new gears and undertake optimisation of post-harvest processes and business models to support profitability.

6. Develop forums and communication materials to support responsible innovation and knowledge transfer for and across Australian community, and with a focus on commercial fisheries and key rightsholders and stakeholders

PROJECT NUMBER • 2023-111

PROJECT STATUS:

CURRENT

Mitigating threatened species bycatch in gillnet fisheries

ORGANISATION:

Charles Darwin University (CDU)

TAGS

Threatened Endangered Protected Species

SPECIES

Integrating recreational fisher experience/satisfaction into decision making

Project number: 2022-170

Project Status:

Completed

Budget expenditure: $288,822.00

Principal Investigator: Neil Howells

Organisation: Hudson Howells

Project start/end date: 2 Jul 2023 - 30 Sep 2024

Contact:

FRDC

TAGS

SPECIES

Need

The need for the study is clearly defined in the FRDC terms of reference for the project:

- Fisher experience is regarded as an important measure of defining optimal resource use for non-commercial fishing sectors.
- The lack of recreational fisher experience data has been highlighted at a national level and was explored in FRDC project 2018-161.
- Key fishing stakeholders have identified their desire to include experiential performance indicators into fisheries harvest strategies to optimise the management of available resources in the Northern Territory. This is especially important in fishery management areas where management for optimised recreational outcomes have been prioritised (e.g. Barramundi).
- The need to apply and test existing frameworks for measuring fisher experience (or satisfaction) is necessary to validate their utility in the Northern Territory and more broadly across jurisdictions.
- This includes understanding the interaction between fisher satisfaction/experience and catch settings and other administrative arrangements that may influence fisher experience.

In summary, there are currently no data available that would enable the linkage of experiential performance indicators into fisheries harvest strategies to optimise the management of available resources in the Northern Territory. The objective of this study is therefore to fully explore recreational fisher experience and associated satisfaction levels as they relate to harvest strategies. In simple terms, NT Fisheries is flying blind in this respect and this study is aimed at providing the department with the information they need for informed decision making. Importantly, the report will include recommendations for the implementation of the identified strategies by Fisheries NT.

Objectives

1. To collect comprehensive data on recreational fishers' experiences and satisfaction levels in particular as they relate to NT fishery harvest strategies.

2. To analyse the collected data to identify key factors influencing recreational fishers' experiences and satisfaction levels in particular as they relate to NT fishery harvest strategies.

3. To integrate the findings from the data analysis and interpretation into NT fishery harvest strategies.

Final report

Authors: Howell N Sexton L Knuckey I Maldonado R Ciaravolo D and Dysart K

Final Report • 1.27 MB

2022-170-DLD.pdf

Project products

Report • 517.23 KB

2022-170 Appendix 1 literature review.pdf

Report • 79.87 KB

2022-170 Appendix 2 Stakeholder Group Findings Report.pdf

Report • 204.62 KB

2022-170 Appendix 3 focus group findings final.pdf

Report • 200.09 KB

2022-170 Appendix 4 Boat Ramp Intercept Survey Questionnaire.pdf

Report • 328.49 KB

2022-170 Appendix 5 - Main Survey Questionnaire.pdf

Report • 1.16 MB

2022-170 Appendix 6 Main Survey Tabulated Results FINAL Jul 2024.xlsx

Report • 2.21 MB

2022-170 Appendix 7 Question by Question Analysis.pdf

Incorporating Aboriginal perspectives into fishery management review processes, using the Northern Territory Barramundi Fishery as a case study

Project number: 2021-098

Project Status:

Current

Budget expenditure: $505,392.00

Principal Investigator: Rachel Groom

Organisation: Charles Darwin University (CDU) Northern Institute

Project start/end date: 28 Apr 2022 - 30 Dec 2025

Contact:

FRDC

TAGS

SPECIES

Need

Commercial in confidence. To know more about this project please contact FRDC.

Objectives

Commercial in confidence

PROJECT NUMBER • 2019-106

PROJECT STATUS:

COMPLETED

Minor use permit for oxytetracycline in non-salmonid finfish

There are no registered or permitted antimicrobial products approved by the Australian Pesticide and Veterinary Medicine Authority (APVMA) for treatment of bacterial infections in finfish. This project developed an application for a minor-use permit (MUP) for the use of oxytetracycline (OTC) to...

ORGANISATION:

University of Adelaide

TAGS

Vaccine

Trade

Toxin

Resource Access And Allocation

SPECIES

PROJECT NUMBER • 2018-097

PROJECT STATUS:

COMPLETED

Survey of Enterprise-level Biosecurity across the Australian Aquaculture Industry

The Australian Government Department of Agriculture and Water Resources (the department) commissioned the independent research company Instinct and Reason to conduct a survey aimed at farm owners/managers in the Australian aquaculture industry. The survey aimed to investigate the level of...

ORGANISATION:

Instinct and Reason

TAGS

SPECIES

Southern Bluefin Tuna

Ecological modelling of the impacts of water development in the Gulf of Carpentaria with particular reference to impacts on the Northern Prawn Fishery

Project number: 2018-079

Project Status:

Completed

Budget expenditure: $411,817.00

Principal Investigator: Eva Plaganyi-Lloyd

Organisation: CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere Crawley

Project start/end date: 6 Jan 2019 - 28 Jan 2021

Contact:

FRDC

TAGS

Resource Access And Allocation

SPECIES

Need

River flow is crucial in the life cycle of prawns that support the Northern Prawn Fishery (NPF), as well as iconic tropical species (e.g. mud crab, barramundi, grunter, and threadfin salmon) of importance to commercial, recreational and Indigenous fisheries, and species with high conservation (e.g. sawfish) and cultural value. Substantial interest in developing irrigated agriculture across northern Australia is reviewed in a recent FRDC report (Kenyon et al. 2018). Water extraction to support agriculture will modify natural flow regimes that support estuarine and coastal fisheries. The trade-offs associated with proposed water resource allocation are currently unknown and research is needed to support decision making related to alternative strategies for managing water resources effectively for both agriculture and marine production and biodiversity conservation. Quantifying these trade-offs entails evaluating how altered river flows might affect the fishery and ecological values. Most work to date has focused on the hydrological rather than ecological aspects (and particularly how to quantify aspects such as the minimum water requirements for ecological components) as managers otherwise need to make decisions without sufficient research and given limited timeframes. Although previous and recent projects such as NAWRA have evaluated the qualitative impacts of changes in river flows on ecological assets, there is a need to quantify impacts both for consideration by affected commercial, recreational, indigenous and other sectors, as well as to provide water resource managers with quantitative estimates such as the minimum water requirements to maintain ecosystem structure and functioning. Such analyses are also complicated by the fact that each catchment is different, and hence models and the associated recommendations need to be tailored to be specific to each catchment area, and there is currently no suitable ecosystem model at the appropriate scale and incorporating key relationships.

Objectives

1. Develop a MICE model that integrates existing data and understanding, and in consultation with stakeholders, to quantify the impacts on key marine species of alternative water extraction scenarios

2. Produce quantitative estimates of the impact of alternative flow regimes on the relative abundance of key fishery and other marine species in the Gulf of Carpentaria, as well as impacts on total fishery catches and value

3. Summarise findings in a technical report and non-technical reports to support sharing findings and engaging in other relevant broader management fora

Fact sheet

Fact Sheet • 2022-03-18 • 3.91 MB

2018-079 fact sheet FINAL.pdf

Final Report • 2022-03-18 • 12.22 MB

2018-079-DLD.pdf

Summary

Using an ecosystem modelling approach, CSIRO in conjunction with colleagues from Northern Prawn Fishery Industry (NPFI), Griffith University and Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries have completed a FRDC study to quantify the impacts and risks to the Gulf of
Carpentaria (GoC) ecosystem of water resource developments (WRD ‐ anthropogenic alteration of freshwater discharge), applied in particular to the Mitchell, the Flinders and the Gilbert River catchments of northern Australia. Key model species include common banana prawns, barramundi, mud crabs, largetooth sawfish as well as mangrove and seagrass habitats

Barramundi origins: determining the contribution of stocking to the Barramundi catch on Queensland's east coast

Project number: 2018-047

Project Status:

Completed

Budget expenditure: $261,776.73

Principal Investigator: Susannah Leahy

Organisation: Department of Primary Industries (QLD)

Project start/end date: 31 Oct 2018 - 31 Jan 2021

Contact:

FRDC

TAGS

SPECIES

Need

This EOI was developed to address the priority, listed by Queensland RAC in the November 2017 Call for Applications, "To Determine the Proportion of Queensland East Coast (Marine and Estuarine)
Wild Barramundi Catch that is of Hatchery Origin"

- Since 2010 at least 4 million barramundi fingerlings have been released into impounded waterways, coastal lagoons, rivers (and estuaries) of Queensland

- the number of barramundi released annually varies between ~330,000 (2010) and ~794,000 (2015)

- whilst stocked fingerlings may suffer high mortality rates, stocked barramundi do migrate downstream and are caught in the wild-harvest commercial net fishery

- the magnitude of the contribution of stocking to the Queensland east coast population of barramundi is unknown

- this problem has limited quantitative stock assessment of barramundi on the Qld east coast

- DNA parentage analyses is a way to unequivocally identify hatchery origin barramundi and has been developed and validated for barramundi at JCU but it relies on having genotypes of the hatchery broodstock and is expensive per fish

- to be useful for a stock assessment any method needs to be able to be applied over multiple years to provide a time series of data, preferably hind-casting using the historic otolith collections maintained by Fisheries Queensland

- the aim of this project is to develop a cheap and effective method to identify the contribution of stocked fish to current and historic catches (via the Fisheries Queenlsand's otolith collections) to support stock status reporting and quantitative stock assessment

Objectives

1. To develop a near infrared spectroscopy model that can distinguish between wild origin and hatchery origin barramundi

2. To develop an otolith chemistry model that can distinguish between wild origin and hatchery origin barramundi

3. To compare the results from the models developed in #1 and #2 against an established method (genetics) to distinguish between wild and hatchery origin fish in wild caught barramundi

4. To evaluate and complete a cost-benefit analysis of the approaches developed

Final report

ISBN: 978-0-7345-0474-6

Authors: Leahy SM Jerry DR Wedding BBC Robins JB Wright CL Sadekov A Boyle S Jones DB Williams SM McCulloch MT Grauf S Pavich L McLennan M Sellin MJ Goldsbury J Saunders RJ

Final Report • 2022-02-24 • 5.66 MB

2018-047-DLD.pdf

Summary

Researchers from Queensland’s Department of Agriculture and Fisheries, James Cook University, and the University of Western Australia tested a range of otolith-based and genetic methods to identify hatchery-born from wild-born Barramundi. The project took place in the Dry Tropics region, where extensive historical and ongoing impoundment stocking (release of hatchery-born Barramundi into freshwater bodies) may be contributing to the downstream wild-capture marine and estuarine fishery. Fish samples were collected from the commercial and recreational wild-capture marine and estuarine fishery in 2019 and 2020, following the major Townsville floods in February 2019. The team identified a cost-effective means of using trace elements in fish otoliths to reliably distinguish hatchery-origin from wild-origin fish, measure the contribution of stocked fish to the wild population, and assess the sustainability of the wild-capture fishery.

PROJECT NUMBER • 2018-016

PROJECT STATUS:

COMPLETED