By Brad Collis
The release of the National Social and Economic Recreational Fishing Survey, highlighted the positive economic and health benefits of recreational fishing for Australians and coincided with the development of a new national recreational fishing committee.
Benefits of the sponsorship include:
• Significant visibility of your organisation and/or brand products and services at an international, national and local level within the aquaculture and fishery sector—the fastest growing primary industry globally and rapid adopter of new scientific approaches.
• Visibility on the conference website, which will be broadly disseminated and promoted through social media.
• Promotion on conference elements such as banners, program, flyers, speaker’s platform, interval projection screens, backdrops, etc., depending on the level of sponsorship chosen.
• Verbal acknowledgment by the symposium chairs at the opening and closing ceremonies or at the start of selected sessions.
• A forum to promote and deliver the benefits of abalone research in the sponsor organisations.
• An exhibition space with a limited number of stands located in a key position to maximize the exhibitors’ visibility.
• Handouts and other promotional items included in the delegate registration packs.
• Advantages apply during the full duration of the conference.
Mangrove Jack (Lutjanus argentimaculatus) are a long lived (>50 years), late maturing (~6 to 10 years) species that can grow to a large size (>1 metre). Their typical distribution in Australian waters extends from Perth, around the north of the continent to Sydney. Mangrove Jack spend several years as juveniles in freshwater and estuarine habitats before migrating to deeper, offshore waters as they near sexual maturity.
Mangrove Jack are popular amongst all fishing sectors; their aggressive feeding and tendency to aggregate (as both juveniles and adults) also makes them vulnerable to overfishing. Juvenile Mangrove Jack are primarily (but not exclusively) caught by Indigenous fishers, recreational fishers and charter boat clients around estuaries and inshore reefs, whereas adults are caught (occasionally in significant quantities) by offshore trawl operations to the west of Cape York.
The sustainability of Mangrove Jack is assessed under the national Status of Australian Fish Stocks (SAFS) reporting framework, which relies on an understanding of the stock structure of each focal species. Previous genetic analyses using mitochondrial and microsatellite markers suggest that Mangrove Jack form a single homogeneous stock in Australian waters. However, these analytical tools often lack the resolution necessary to detect fine-scale stock structure in larval dispersing fishes. This in turn compromises current stock assessment approaches for Mangrove Jack (undertaken at the jurisdictional or management unit level) as there may be a spatial mismatch between the area of the assessment unit/s and the true stock structure of this species; a situation confounded by a limited understanding of the dynamics of ontogenetic migration/connectivity in Mangrove Jack.
This being the case, there is a pressing need to examine the population structure and connectivity of Mangrove Jack across its Australian range. This will be achieved through a combination of cutting-edge genetic methods (i.e. single nucleotide polymorphisms), otolith micro-chemistry and parasite analyses, in order to address the national FRDC priority “Resolving stock uncertainty for priority species (including Mangrove Jack)”.
Two levels of bursary will be provided. The main bursary will fund the full attendance costs of emerging leaders (excluding some opt-in activities), with a smaller bursary to support the attendance of existing leaders.
Pre-Conference social gathering and networking:
Conference mentors will create a private social media group with successful applicants to begin introductions and create a casual ‘hub’ for contact and socialising. Mentors will initiate and prompt engagement within the group to build rapport. Closer to the conference, the group will meet online prior for a more formal introduction, led by mentors. In this meeting, attendees will:
-Will briefly introduce themselves (ideally with a recent brag photo/clip) and give an overview of their rec fishing environment, including an example of a conference theme they think they/their area do well and another they see as needing improvement.
-Identify keynote speakers or high-profile conference attendees that they would particularly like to engage with.
-Discuss how they can make the most of the conference, both individually and as a group. This will include developing strategies to maximise group coverage of the conference, means of comparing notes (OneNote etc) and the kind of outputs they think would benefit the broader rec fishing community.
-work with mentors to develop a conference action plan, encompassing all the above discussion.
This will be used by mentors and organizers to frame up attendee activities and help facilitate networking events during the conference.
During conference
Delegates will be tasked broadly with:
-Participating in the program and associated events and meetings (following pre-conference co-development with mentors as above).
-Completing pre-work assigned by mentors to ensure they get the most out of participation.
-Demonstrate initiative to grow their networks by directly engaging key conference delegates.
-Collaboratively recording insights from participation for use in developing key outputs (see Post conference below).
-Develop/extend communications outputs to help those not able to attend the event to understand key insights.
Post conference
Delegates will
-Reflect on pre-conference expectations and goals, and identify future actions for further professional growth.
-Contribute towards development of a shared formal synthesis report, that summarises key insights, opportunities for adoption in an Australian context, and strategic gaps.
-Meet with ARFF/FRDC Research subcommittee to share insights and inform future prioritisation discussions.
-Evaluate results from extension of communication outputs developed and disseminated by the group.
The project aligns with FRDC outcomes and enabling strategies – building capability and capacity (4); and provide foundational information and support services (5). and outcomes addressing a culture that is inclusive and forward thinking (3): community trust, respect and value (5); growth for enduring prosperity (1) and best practices and production systems (2)
Whilst resources throughout the recreational fishing sector exist, there is a gap for learning materials that are structured to enable learning – often content does not consider learning outcomes, the sequence or activities necessary to learn and apply, or mechanisms to assess and recognise competency. There is also a gap in learning that specifically targets adults — with a recruitment focus of women and breaking down perceived barriers to entry — with a holistic approach that can take one from beginner to competent and well-versed angler.
Developing such a course will:
- Break down perceived barriers to entry for women into recreational fishing
- Facilitate a measurable, fast-tracked, capability-based journey into recreational fishing
- Establish and provide a gateway into other opportunities in fishing and aquaculture through recreational fishing
- Contribute to increasing the percentage of positive and collaborative individuals in the recreational fishing community through developing capability and capacity build a database of enthusiastic recreational fishers and their competencies
This course will actively work to increase the economic throughput of the recreational fishing sector by breaking down the barriers-to-entry for a vast and largely untapped segment of the market (women), which has the parallel benefit of shifting the perceived value of recreational fishing as a lifestyle, thus increasing the household investment in the activity.
The course intends to inspire a fresh generation of thought-leaders in the recreational fishing community, enabling a broad appreciation of the interplay of layers that influence and impact positive fishing experiences and a robust fishery.
In order to support a greater degree of systems thinking in its advisory committees, it is proposed to expose all committee members to the potential approaches to priority setting through a systems lens and benefits of these approaches, and then work with a subset of Research Advisory Committees [and possibly others] to test how bringing tools such as theory of change into their deliberations could assist them to deliver better designed priorities. Working specifically towards theories of change in the committee processes, at appropriate levels of complexity, is expected to provide (i) a context to making approaches of different committee members more explicit, (ii) a basis for better design logic, and (iii) a way of more readily communicating the committee's priorities. The focus of this approach on identifying and working back from ultimate objectives helps frame what may legitimately be narrow priorities in a wider analysis of system drivers such as incoherent policy environments or climate change and thus enable larger agendas to be built around such issues across FRDC. An explicit emphasis on barriers, enablers and assumptions, as well as what is necessary and sufficient to achieve the objectives, also provides a strong basis for evaluating progress and learning. Together these attributes are anticipated to achieve the intent of supporting better FRDC priority setting and increased impact for its stakeholders.
