SBT has supported a valuable domestic fishery in Australia for many decades. The recent expansion in recreational SBT catches raises the need to monitor and manage recreational fishing activities; to secure investments by anglers and charter boat businesses and ensure that harvesting is consistent with the SBT rebuilding strategy.

Detailed information on catch levels, the geographical and seasonal distribution of fishing activities and the sector’s characteristics is fundamental to managing recreational fishing activities. State and Commonwealth governments are in the process of developing resource-sharing arrangements for SBT. Information collected by the project will be crucial in developing management options and resource sharing arrangements.

The development and application of an agreed methodology for obtaining regular, statistically robust estimates of recreational and charter fishing catch of SBT is also a Wildlife Trade Operation (WTO) condition for the SBT fishery, and Australia has an obligation to report all SBT catches to the Commission for the Conservation of Southern Bluefin Tuna (CCSBT).

There is a need for a consolidated national report on the status of key wild catch Australian fish stocks, focusing on commercial and recreational target species. One pitfall of guides like the Australia’s Sustainable Seafood Guide is their focus on entire species, without considering differences among stocks within each species. Consequently, a poor status determination for one stock can result in a poor status determination for all stocks of that species regardless of whether or not the other stocks are healthy. Government can avoid this pitfall by clearly articulating the status of individual fish stocks. Australia’s different jurisdictions have demonstrated their capacity to work constructively together to achieve common goals (e.g. joint stock assessments for shared stocks). However, the current differences in scope, depth, terminology and benchmarking in jurisdictionally based Fishery Status Reports make it difficult to readily compare the status of stocks across jurisdictions and build a coherent national status of key species.

The National Fishery Status Reports would not be promoted as an eco-labelling guide but rather as a government produced instrument designed to simplify comparison of the status of key wild capture fish stocks around Australia both within and among jurisdictions. This information would be available for the general public, policy makers and industry to make informed decisions in relation to the actual health of various stocks. The reports would also provide an important and accurate information source for international organisations (e.g. FAO). The process of producing these reports will improve communication between the jurisdictions, leading to a better understanding of the status determinations made by each jurisdiction and how these compare. One of the main outcomes already achieved from the recent jurisdictional planning workshops is the convergence on a common system of benchmarking and terminology for use across jurisdictions.

Statistics on Australian fisheries production, gross value of production (GVP) and trade is required to meet a wide range of demands.

First: To assist in making investment decisions and planning of marketing strategies.

Second: To provide the basis for setting of research priorities by fisheries managers, industry and research organisations and the selection of a research portfolio by funding agencies. The Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry through ABARE, contributes to a number of international databases including databases managed by the FAO and OECD. Information at the international level can be important in relation to international negotiations on issues such as transboundary fisheries, in analysing trade opportunities and threats and is essential for participating in fora such as APEC and WTO.

Third: The gross value of production for specific fisheries are used for determining research and development levies for the FRDC and for determining industry contributions to research. Because the estimates form the basis for research levies for each fishery, it is important for the system to be independent from those involved in the management and marketing processes to ensure neutrality and integrity of the estimates.

As identified at the meeting in late October 2009, between ABARE and industry stake holders, there is also a need for other economic data that is not currently incorporated in the AFS. In particular there is a need to ensure that the method used to estimate GVP in each jurisdiction is robust and consistently applied. To meet this need, this project incorporates an audit component, to commence in 2010-11, to assess the extent to which the method used to calculate GVP is robust and consistent across jurisdictions, and to determine the fishery related data sets that currently exist across jurusdictions.

Through its policy on fisheries bycatch, the Commonwealth acknowledges that ecological sustainable development must be based on a strategic approach to addressing bycatch interactions. There is a need to mitigate fishery interactions with non-target species, particularly threatened, endangered and protected (TEP) species, consistent with AFMA’s aim of promoting the sustainable use of fisheries resources by conserving marine ecosystems and biodiversity. Industry, AFMA and researchers have previously collaborated to address bycatch issues in Commonwealth fisheries, with outputs including the implementation of mitigation devices in specific fisheries, the development of bycatch action plans, bycatch workplans and the ecological risk management (ERM) process. In many cases, however, industry cannot readily demonstrate the benefits of these activities, which is critical for differentiating Australian seafood products from those of less environmentally-friendly competitors.

There is a need for an overarching approach to bycatch mitigation to ensure consistent standards across fisheries and transparent indicators of performance. Bycatch issues are often fisheries specific, but the development of mitigation strategies in individual fisheries needs to address the same core elements, e.g. stakeholder consultation, performance testing, monitoring and compliance. Standards are required to ensure that each of these core elements are adequately addressed in response to the emergence of a bycatch issue.

Standards will also assist the fishing industry in fostering positive public perception and meeting legislative requirements, e.g. strategic assessments under the EPBC Act . Standards are particularly important to fisheries seeking to move to co-management where there is a need for greater transparency and accountability.

The ecological risk assessment process recently undertaken jointly by AFMA and CSIRO has identified that sharks generally, are high priority species which require focussed management attention. In the Southern and Eastern Scalefish and Shark Fishery (SESSF) this is particularly the case for upper slope Southern and Eastern gulper sharks (including Harrison’s dogfish and Southern dogfish) which have been found to be severely depleted and have been nominated as threatened species under the EPBC Act. AFMA is now developing management responses to address these identified ecological risks, and there are a number of complimentary processes currently underway. These include the bycatch working group in the SESSF, which is currently preparing a bycatch work plan to be developed and implemented during 2008. AFMA is also establishing an expert shark and ray (Chondrichthyan) working group to develop appropriate management responses for these species across all fisheries. There is also a small working group in the South East Trawl Fishery (SETF) which is looking closely at the deepwater shark species of the lower slope and additional work is being undertaken to provide immediate management recommendations in relation to Harrison’s dogfish in particular. However, despite these various initiatives, there is a need to review available information on the upper slope gulper sharks (including species other than just Harrison’s dogfish) to improve understanding of levels of interaction and to provide advice on future management options.