Australia has an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) declared adjacent to its Antarctic territorial claims in East Antarctica. Australia has also a direct interest in BANZARE Bank and Elan Bank due to shelf claims and their close relationship to the Kerguelen Plateau. The EEZ in East Antarctica does not include an Australian Fishing Zone (AFZ), thus this area is effectively 'high seas' and the Australian fishing industry has no special privileges in this part of the Convention area. However, ALPL started fishing in East Antarctica in 2015 and have a strong interest to continue fishing activities if catch limits in East Antarctica allow for economical operations.
CCAMLR's failure to assess Antarctic toothfish stocks in East Antarctica with tag-based stock assessments has resulted in a highly precautionary approach for setting catch limits in the area, with small and potentially uneconomical catch limits spread across a number fishable blocks. There is an urgent need to (a) delineate the structure and linkages of Antarctic toothfish stocks around Antarctica and particularly in East Antarctica, and (b) develop alternative assessment approaches to enable a reliable evaluation of stock biomass and the impact of the fishery on stock status in this area. In particular, the project will provide an evaluation of whether Antarctic toothfish could be suitable for the close-kin mark-recapture method to estimate biomass in East Antarctica.
Australia has maintained a leadership role in CCAMLR, including SC-CAMLR since its inception. Australia wishes to maintain the precautionary approach of CCAMLR and its ability to meet environmental objectives as well as those of the fishing industry. This project will contribute to Australia's CCAMLR obligations as a fishing nation to conduct research towards a robust fishery stock assessment, and provide an important opportunity to influence the management of activities which have the potential to adversely affect marine living resources in high seas areas adjacent to the Australian EEZ.

This project addresses policy objectives identified under the Fisheries Management Act (FMA, 1991) and the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC, 1999) relating to long term ecological sustainability of marine resources and environments in the AFZ. It will address the need to identify impacts of fishing activities on target and non-target species (FMA, 1991, Section 3, Part 1b) and how potential impacts might be mitigated to ensure the continued ecological viability of natural marine resources including benthic habitats in the Australian EEZ (EA, 2002). As such, the proposed project specifically addresses objectives relevant to the strategic assessment of the HIMI fishery (EA, 2002) and is also directly relevant to Program 2 (ecosystem-based fisheries management) outlined in AFMA’s strategic research plan, to base management decisions on a knowledge of impacts on fisheries ecosystems and minimize impacts arising from fishing activities (AFMA, 2005). It will also provide information that will help satisfy the requirements of the Marine Stewardship Council for certifying the mackerel icefish fishery. These requirements include undertaking an assessment of risks to benthic systems and identifying a strategy to mitigate moderate to high risks. The outputs could also be used to help understand the role and adequacy of the HIMI Marine Reserve and Conservation Zones.

The ecological assessment of fishery impacts in the Southern Ocean has also been identified by the SARAG as a priority research area. The proposed project will address three priority projects identified as part of the ecological assessment of the fishery research plan, which are:
• The effects of trawling on benthic ecosystems in the HIMI region,
• The effects of longline fishing on benthic ecosystems, and
• The effects of trap fishing on benthic ecosystems.

References
(see reference list in "Background" section)