13 results
Industry
PROJECT NUMBER • 2016-116
PROJECT STATUS:
COMPLETED

Development of a 5-year sector and NT Strategic Research, Development and Extension (RD&E) Plan for Northern Territory fisheries and aquaculture based on priority needs of major stakeholder sectors

The Fisheries Research and Development Corporation’s (FRDC) Northern Territory Research Advisory Committee (NT RAC) recognised that a 5-year Research Development and Extension (RD&E) Plan was a major strategic need of the NT but acknowledged that there was limited capacity among sectors to...
ORGANISATION:
Fishwell Consulting Pty Ltd
Industry
PROJECT NUMBER • 2013-225
PROJECT STATUS:
COMPLETED

Tactical Research Fund: Developing a management framework and harvest strategies for small scale multi-species, multi-method community based fisheries, using the South Australian Lakes and Coorong Fishery as a case study

The commercial Lakes and Coorong Fishery (LCF) operates at the end of the Murray-Darling Basin where the river system meets the Southern Ocean, encompassing a diverse range of freshwater, estuarine and marine habitats and communities. This multi-gear fishery targets a range of species...
ORGANISATION:
Fishwell Consulting Pty Ltd
Communities
PROJECT NUMBER • 2017-069
PROJECT STATUS:
COMPLETED

Indigenous Capacity Building Program

This project aimed to address the need to increase the number of Indigenous Australians with capacity to engage in management and governance of fisheries and aquatic resources, by developing a capacity building program with supporting materials and conducting capacity building activities with...
ORGANISATION:
Fishwell Consulting Pty Ltd

Empowering stakeholders to initiate and advance R&D projects in the seafood industry

Project number: 2007-304
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $136,000.00
Principal Investigator: Ian Knuckey
Organisation: Fishwell Consulting Pty Ltd
Project start/end date: 26 May 2007 - 30 Aug 2008
Contact:
FRDC

Need

As outlined in the consultation section there is qualitative evidence of support for such a project and there has been an indication that Industry would relish the opportunity to develop their R&D ideas into projects. This would empower their members and associations to conduct relevant R&D and champion the need to take more responsibility for R&D directions.

This project seeks to achieve outcomes identified in all the programs in the FRDC 2005-10 R&D Plan. In addition, all proposals will need to link in with existing industry specific R&D plans so it will allow stakeholders to develop research projects that will assist in achieving the outcomes identified in relevant stakeholder R&D plans

Currently some industries and individuals are paying hundreds of thousands dollars for R&D. They are often unaware, or do not have the knowledge to use their financial and human resources to value add to their research dollars by leveraging further assistance. This project will provide a means for this to occur, leading to improved projects and more wide ranging outcomes.

There is a general lack of expertise amongst stakeholders including commercial, recreational associations and indigenous groups to develop their own R&D projects. As such they often merely tag onto research agencies’ projects which may not really provide desired stakeholder outcomes.

A significant proportion of R&D funding is directed towards agency overheads and oncosts, as well as directly towards projects. It is envisaged that proposals that are developed under this project will seek to minimise oncosts apportioned towards such externally funded projects.

The process used in this project will allow stakeholders to develop a range of skills so as to be able to participate in research programs that focus on good management, maximising economic, environmental and social benefits for the whole community through stakeholder specific research.

Objectives

1. For stakeholders to be empowered and develop the necessary skills to prepare, submit and conduct their own R&D projects
2. To increase leverage for existing research resources expended by stakeholders
3. To quantify the need and level of use of the service and identify if the qualitative level of support is corroborated
4. The development of at least 5 stakeholder sponsored applications during 2007/8 with Industry members being the principal, or co-investigator, in all projects
5. To improve extension and take up of findings through improved stakeholder ownership of outcomes.

Final report

ISBN: 978-0-9805388-4-7
Author: Ian Knuckey
Environment
Environment
PROJECT NUMBER • 2019-072
PROJECT STATUS:
CURRENT

Multiple - Before After Control Impact analysis of the effect of a 3D marine seismic survey on Danish Seine catch rates

The project is a four phase research program being conducted in the Danish seine commercial fishery off Lakes Entrance that looks to: 1. Examine effect of seismic testing on Danish seine catch rates of Tiger Flathead 2. Examine effect of seismic testing on Danish seine catch rates...
ORGANISATION:
Fishwell Consulting Pty Ltd

Trials of oceanographic data collection on commercial fishing vessels in SE Australia

Project number: 2022-007
Project Status:
Completed
Budget expenditure: $347,802.00
Principal Investigator: Ian Knuckey
Organisation: Fishwell Consulting Pty Ltd
Project start/end date: 31 Jul 2022 - 30 May 2025
Contact:
FRDC

Need

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

Objectives

1. Effective installation and operation of oceanographic data collection equipment on network of commercial fishing vessels using a range of common fishing gear
2. To provide QC’d data direct to fishers in near real-time to assist in habitat characterisation and the targeting of effort
3. To cost-effectively increase the spatial resolution of sub-surface physical data collected in Australia’s inshore, shelf, upper-slope, and offshore waters by fitting commercial fishing equipment from a variety of gear types with low-cost temperature/pressure sensors
4. To make the QC’d temperature depth data publicly available through the IMOS-AODN portal for uptake and use in ways that support safe maritime operations the sustainable management of marine resources, and improves understanding of drivers of change.

Article

Final Report • 2024-11-07 • 7.45 MB
2022-007-DLD.pdf

Summary

Working with IMOS and oceanographers at the University of New South Wales (UNSW), Fishwell Consulting engaged its established networks across the Australian commercial fishing community to harness the capacity of commercial fishing vessels in environmental data acquisition. Deployment of temperature/depth sensors on commercial fishing vessels was shown to augmentand complement more expensive data collection platforms (e.g. ocean gliders, remote operated vehicles, Argo floats, dedicated research vessels) to provide much needed sub-surface temperature data to improve ocean circulation models and forecasting capacity. In proof-of-concept trials conducted over twelve months (from May 2023), more than 30 fishing vessels and their fishing gear were equipped with temperature sensors and data transmission equipment. These trials yielded more than 2.8 million data points from the sea surface to 1,214m depth considerably expanding existing data records. In particular, waters previously poorly observed, including the Great Australian Bight, Joseph Bonaparte Gulf, and the Gulf of Carpentaria, yielded valuable sub-surface temperature data.
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