Fisheries resources are managed for biological, economic and social purposes or objectives. Recommendations made at the Advisory Committee (MACs and FACs) level have significant economic implications for key stakeholders and for the wider community who have an interest in the returns gained from resource utility.

The current low level of understanding of fisheries resource economics amongst those in decision-making roles precludes the capacity to integrate economic parameters and indicators into assessment and decision-making processes. This generates lost opportunity in current management and is a barrier to the development of economic targets for fisheries and the selection of optimal fisheries management & harvest systems.

A recently completed FRDC report, ‘Evaluating the Performance of Australian Marine Capture Fisheries’ (2009), examined the performance of Australian marine capture fisheries and found a massive gap between actual and potential performance. The same project identified the need for more strategic management as the highest priority in closing this gap, which is targeted through this project.

Increasing the understanding of fisheries resource economics amongst members of MACs and FACs is therefore considered necessary to assist the uptake of management tools that would enhance the economic performance of wild-catch fisheries (AFMA, 2007: Economics in Commonwealth fisheries management - Workshop final report, 2 March 2007, Canberra). Most significantly, increasing the understanding of fisheries resource economics principles will support the achievement of Future Harvest outcomes.

The target audiences for the Future Harvest Master Class includes fisheries managers, advising fisheries biologists, & industry representatives associated with key CRC partner investors in the Future Harvest business theme. Specificially, the Master Classes will be offered to members of those MACs or FACs which advise on those fisheries of interest to the key CRC partner investors.

Aboriginal wild catch is aspirational, seasonal and culture-dependent. For these reasons, it does not compete well against large-scale, industrial fishing operations. Addressing the FRDC’s Indigenous Sector strategy to improve understanding and engagement that ‘best support individual and community economic development’ (FRDC 2015), this project aims to develop a niche market of boutique seafoods, together with investigating how the arts and tourism sectors can foster fisheries management for greater Indigenous community benefit.

A Tasmanian Aboriginal engagement framework in fisheries has not yet been developed by government (Lee 2016, in press). This project will create the conditions for extensions development, based upon resetting engagement terms between Indigenous peoples and government, providing a toolkit of self-determining strategies for regional development. Economic models for future development of fisheries can build upon the capacity of Indigenous communities to translate value into benefit in subsequent projects, such as employment opportunities within the network chain of wild catch procurement to presentation.

There is a need to provide best practice guidance that demonstrates Australia’s commitment to international obligations, such as 2007’s UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. In Australia, building on the growing jurisprudence that affirms native title rights to land, the High Court in 2013 extended such rights to commercial fishing in the Torres Strait in its Akiba v Commonwealth decision (Butterly 2013). However, judicial recognition of Indigenous fishing or other marine-based rights does not in itself provide specific guidance on how those environmental resources should be managed culturally and economically.