The rapidly changing global trading environment is placing increasing demands on Australia's seafood
industry to demonstrate that their product is safe and that it will not cause illness now or in the future.
Meeting these demands means that seafood businesses need to understand and manage the food
safety risks associated with their products and processes.

Changes to the natural environment, including through increased pollution of the marine environment
has resulted in new and emerging food safety issues that need to be better understood to enable them to
be managed. Development of new products and processs designed to increase shelf life and improve
convenience to the consumers also pose food safety management challenges.

Meeting these needs individually would require significant investment. Tapping into a global network of
experts and undertaking research as part of a national food industry development effort will leverage
investment into these areas.

The change in focus of fisheries management towards ecosystem-based management (Pitcher 2001) is a worldwide trend. Within Australia it is particularly evident in the requirements of the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act, and in the development of regional marine plans (RMPs) under Australia’s Oceans Policy. The former requires strategic assessment of the ecological impacts of fishing, including assessing trophic impacts. The latter seeks to integrate management of entire regions through an ecosystem approach that considers impacts from all uses of the marine environment (including impacts of other users on fishery ecosystems). The southeast region is the first to be evaluated under Oceans Policy.

Even without the “stick” of EPBC and RMP, there are good reasons to attempt to synthesize current data and understanding of the SEF ecosystem, and to model the impacts of and on the fishery. Specific questions that need addressing include:
·What changes in the fish community have taken place in the past, and what are the consequences for current fishery production and value?
·What further changes might be expected under planned reduction or elimination of discarding in the SET?
·What are the implications for the fishery of current rapid recovery in seal populations?
·What are the reasons for and impacts of year-to-year variability in the SEF ecosystem (including regional circulation and primary productivity) on distribution and catches of quota species?

This study will provide a set of tools to explore answers to these questions.

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