RRFF meeting outcomes

[dayoo]

I had a big day in at Fisheries today reviewing the technical matters outlined by the Commercial and Charter sections.

Along with Bill Corten, Ray Ozich and a special guest appearance by Timiboy we had a bit of argi bargi with one of the Commercial Sector reps who was pusing to have the Commercial TAC increased by 4 tonnes to 112 tonnes. We agreed to disagree and the decision was left for resolution by Fisheries and the Minister.

The Commercial and Charter sectors have proposed that their licences be for RRFF species which includes snapper, pearl perch and traglin jew rather than just snapper alone. The commercial licences for RRFF species will be limited to approx 135 licences but could increase subject to determination of any appeals. The charter sector will be limited to approx 80 RRFF licences but also could increase subject to appeals. The charter sector have proposed individual TAC's and be issued with tags based on the average snapper weight of 1.6kg (i.e. 32 tonnes = 32000kgs divided by 1.6 = 20,000 tags). The number of tags allocated to each charter operator will be based on catch history.

It was agreed that these two sectors could still fish for pearl perch and trag when the commercial and charter TAC had been filled.

The recreation reps present agreed for the sake of consistency that the permit for the recreational sector (no fee, funded by Fisheries) should be for RRFF species with only snapper being recorded in the log books. It was considered that any future monitoring of other RRFF species (e.g. pearl perch and trag) could be incorporated in the log book and would assist Fisheries with any future stock assessment of these two species.

Of course the recreation sector would still be able to target pearlies and trag if the TAC for snapper was filled.

The State Governmant Departments are presently under caretaker mode due to the forthcoming election and no decision will be made until the recommendations of the RRFF working group are submitted by Fisheries to the incoming Minister and Government.

I understand that Sunfish is in agreement with the recreation permit for RRFF species rather than just snapper. I have been requested to bring this to the attention of Ausfish members for comment and feedback.

Please no hijacking maybe Lucky Phill could start a separate poll.

Cheers
Barry

[honda900]

Barry,

Were Mahi Mahi, kingfish, amberjack, grass sweetlip and cobia still on the agenda to be classed as RRFF?

Regards
HOnda

[dayoo]

Honda,

Yes mate, these species did not get a mention specifically but some are also covered under the Inshore Fin Fishery in respect of bag limits. All could eventually be under RRFF if recommendations are approved.

Some members of the Inshore Fin Fishery review might enlighten us further.

Cheers
Barry

[oldboot]

There are some who are wondering how Mahi Mahi qualify for being a reef fish of any sort.....to a lesser ( only a little ) extent AJ's and king fish.

Seeing as how all of those realy are pelagic but hand arround reef structure when it suits them.

Where as snapper is clearly a rocky reef spicies and is rarely found elsewhere.

cheers

[dfox]

There are some who are wondering how Mahi Mahi qualify for being a reef fish of any sort.....to a lesser ( only a little ) extent AJ's and king fish.

Seeing as how all of those realy are pelagic but hand arround reef structure when it suits them.

Where as snapper is clearly a rocky reef spicies and is rarely found elsewhere.

cheers

Dont quote me on it, but i think it has a bit to do with regional captures. Looking at it from a commercial view, the south east fishery (L1) consists of mainly these species. Snapper and pearl perch are the most targeted fish with AJ's, kingies and the like making up a high proportion of the bycatch. Its something fisheries make up i believe, its only recently that gold and black spot cod (estuary cod) which arent CRFF have been included into the commercial RQ (reef quota) system as coral reef fin fish... foxy