STOP Commercial netting in the Great Sandy Marine Park !

[Douglas]

Bit of info for everybody.

Sandy Straits is a designated Conservation Zone within the Great Sandy National Park.

Does anybody know what the total commercial net catch is for the 4 commercial logbook grids that include Sandy Straits for the last 5 years (2012 - 2016 inclusive)?

3 million kgs......... 3,000,000 kilograms............Not a mistake.....3,000 tonnes.

Hate to imagine what the catch might be if it wasn't a Conservation Zone!!

Sandy Straits is a bit like the "Horn of Plenty" in respect of commercial netting.

It'll never run out.

Will it???

[Scotto]

Here ya go Douglas :-

GSS_commercial_catch_2006-2016.jpg

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Recreational fishing value


Referencing the State Wide 2010 Recreational fishing survey - Over a third of all recreational fishers (in excess of 700,000 state wide) lived in the Brisbane region but the participation rate among local residents was highest in the Mackay and Wide Bay-Burnett (Fraser Coast) regions, where 28% and 26% of the population were recreational fishers, respectively.


Localised depletion is being experienced across a number of key important recreational fish species both locally across the Fraser Coast region and across the state. Catch rates for anglers on the Fraser Coast region alone, have dropped from 7.8 fish landed per person per trip in 1986 to 0.81 fish per person per trip in 2003. This is the most current research but concerns are that this decline continues much further today and is in need of further review. Reference: Moore N. 1986 Recreational fishing in Hervey Bay and Great Sandy Strait. QDPI Information series Murphy I. 2003. 2003 Creel Survey. A ‘Snapshot’ of Recreational Fishers and Their Catches in the Hervey Bay Region, Queensland, between January and May, 2003.


Visitor Expenditure generated through Recreational Fishing across the Fraser Coast equates to approximately $39 million per annum. It is important to note that this figure is based on visitors only, and it does not take into account the value generated by recreational fishing by keen fisherman who reside within the Fraser Coast - this figure would be significant.


The figure of $39 million is compiled by the International Visitor Survey (IVS) and the National Visitor Survey (NVS) which is collated by Tourism Research Australia. This data is then distributed to the State Tourism Organisations and then distributed to the regional tourism organisations such as Fraser Coast Tourism and Events. Through the Fraser Coast Destination Tourism Plan, it is estimated that if the Fraser Coast is to increase its share of the Queensland Recreational Fishing Market by 8% by the year 2020, the value of visitor expenditure generated purely through recreational fishing would equate to approximately $107 million per annum by the year 2020. Again this does not include local expenditure – purely visiting anglers.


The Fraser Coast contains more fish diversity than the entire Great Barrier Reef being a crossover zone between tropical and temperate waters. It is recognised as the most southern limit for Wild Barramundi on the East Coast of Australia. Reference:  Burnett Mary Regional Group for Natural Resource Management 2014. The Great Sandy Biosphere.


In 2009 the Great Sandy Region was awarded Biosphere Reserve status by UNESCO, the global organisation that also awards World Heritage Listings. This decision gives worldwide recognition to both the Fraser Coast and Cooloola Regions, and the Wide Bay Burnett Coastline, putting the Great Sandy Region in the same class as the Galapagos Islands, the Central Amazon, the Everglades and Uluru. The Great Sandy Region is also recognised as an important RAMSAR Site, a dugong protection area and major turtle ecosystem.

You can sign the petition here - https://www.change.org/p/dr-steven-m...dy-marine-park

Regards Scotto

[Scotto]

Commercial fishing Value in the Great Sandy Straits

While the value of the key species (including Tailor) is approx : $1.67m the value of the total catch is closer to $3.3m based on an average $5/kg. Based on $4/kg it is $2.6m and based on $6/kg it is $4.0m. For the key species we have used the State Average Gate Price. These figures are only an approximation and more detail would be required to produce more accurate figures. Mullet is the largest component of the fishery by value at approximately $0.77m.

GSS_commercial_catch_2006-2016-E1_edited-1.jpg

[Douglas]

Scottie

What's happened to the tailor?

These grids take in the lower outside beaches of Fraser Island and Rainbow Beach.

These areas (particularly Fraser Island) were THE place to go for tailor.

Now I see that the tailor catches for both of those areas are down to 5 tonnes per year.

Are there none there anymore?

[Scotto]

Scottie

What's happened to the tailor?

These grids take in the lower outside beaches of Fraser Island and Rainbow Beach.

These areas (particularly Fraser Island) were THE place to go for tailor.

Now I see that the tailor catches for both of those areas are down to 5 tonnes per year.

Are there none there anymore?

Yep - serious issues with Tailor Douglas !

And we still have less than 3000 signatures on-line .....

We NEED every rec fishers support who fishes with-in our GSMP to sign this petition and share with your contacts @ https://www.change.org/p/dr-steven-m...dy-marine-park

Thanks Scotto

[Douglas]

I can't work out the maths.

If these guys are only getting $4 - $6 per kilo and the retailer is getting anything from $20 - $30 per kilo why are these guys doing it?

It'd have to be habit or way of life 'cos it makes no economic sense to be catching these things while somebody else makes the profits.

I recall the trawler fleets in Hervey Bay and Tin Can Bay going through a similar rationalisation process a few years ago.

Those who operated trawlers as a family way of life or habit simply didn't survive. Those who operated as a business did ok. Sure was some thinning of the numbers.

It looks like the same thing is starting to happen in the net fishery.

[Apollo]

I can't work out the maths.

If these guys are only getting $4 - $6 per kilo and the retailer is getting anything from $20 - $30 per kilo why are these guys doing it?

It'd have to be habit or way of life 'cos it makes no economic sense to be catching these things while somebody else makes the profits.

I recall the trawler fleets in Hervey Bay and Tin Can Bay going through a similar rationalisation process a few years ago.

Those who operated trawlers as a family way of life or habit simply didn't survive. Those who operated as a business did ok. Sure was some thinning of the numbers.

It looks like the same thing is starting to happen in the net fishery.

One price would be whole fish and the other would be filleted, processed fish. Take into account processing costs, yield rates, overhead costs, markup percentage, etc, the numbers work out about right.

[Scotto]

Just SIGN the petition and share with all your friends & contacts we can STOP commercial fishing in our Great Sandy Marine Park under this current Full Term Review - SIGN HERE https://www.change.org/p/dr-steven-m...dy-marine-park

Thanks Scotto

[Douglas]

Take into account processing costs, yield rates, overhead costs, markup percentage, etc, the numbers work out about right.

Thanks Apollo

The point I was trying to make (not very clearly) is that a return for a commercial fisherman of $4 - $6 kg for product isn't much at all.

The retailers are a different (but significant) part of the seafood industry problem. I guess its the same with suppliers and wholesaler markup on everything from fishing tackle to cars to furniture to electronics.

On line purchasing has helped sort some of that out. Not many opportunities to buy seafood online except from some of these same retailers I guess, so the price is still way over the top.

But I still can't work out how a Nile Perch can be caught in Egypt, transported 13,000km to Australia and sold as fillets for $18.50 kg (last time I looked). The processing costs etc would have to be the same and the transport and import costs would most certainly be more.

So why the difference? Would retailer markup be the reason?

In the bottom end of the Straits where Scotty's figures come from there are apparently 65 commercial fishermen operating ( 65 is from the QFish database)

If each one only gets 1/65th or .015 of the total annual catch, they can't possibly make money and stay in business unless the resource stocks are being depleted (and rapidly).

Maybe that's what's happened to tailor in the area?

[Douglas]

I've been following up on the tailor issue in the Sandy Straits/Fraser Island area.

Up until 2000, commercial catches of tailor were averaging 33 tonnes per year.

What the recreational catch was I have no idea but Fraser beaches were considered Aus wide as THE place to go for tailor. But it would have to have been considerable.

After 2000, the bottom fell out of the tailor catches in the area. The commercials dropped to an average of 18 tonnes per year AND HAVE NEVER RECOVERED.

From enquiries, it seems that word on the street is that Fraser beaches are no longer THE place to go to catch tailor. No tailor is the apparent reason.

A 45% drop in the only measuring tool available (commercial logbooks) must surely have rung alarm bells within Qld Fisheries.

One would have thought that the logical Dept Fisheries response would have been a closure of the tailor fishery in the area until stocks recovered.

I'm coming from a long way back historically with this subject so I don't know if Qld Dept Fisheries actually reacted.

Anybody got info?

Whatever the reaction was (if any) then it didn't work.

This isn't a rec fishing vs commercial fishing issue.

The issue is management of fisheries resources in the area.

Loss of stock takes a while to show up and is a good reason to ensure that effective stock monitoring is in place. 2000 to 2016 is 17 years (inclusive) and a long, long time for alarm bells to be ringing in the Fisheries office unless somebody turned the bell off. Like taking a battery out of a smoke detector. That's what happened in the scallop crisis last year. Fisheries Qld took their eye off the ball.

The danger is that the depleted tailor stock has become the norm after 17 years and any monitoring simply becomes one depleted stock number against another depleted stock number each year. Not much change in stock numbers so everything is ok.

Aren't we at Dept of Fisheries doing a marvellous management job! The fisheries stock assessment gets the "sustainable" tick and maybe that's what happened with tailor following the latest stock assessment data available.

Tailor stocks weren't measured and when the measuring started (sometime around 2012 I think), the "measurer" wasn't aware that the stocks had been in trouble for a long time.

Am happy to hear from anybody who knows more about it.