AFTA meets with NSW DPI on snapper and kingfish proposals
STATEMENT
The AFTA Board met with Tara Black, Deputy Secretary Fisheries and Forestry, and senior officials at NSW DPI on the 10th September, to discuss the Department’s draft snapper and yellowtail kingfish harvest proposals.
Immediately following the Department’s announcement on the 1st September, AFTA wrote to Ms Black setting out 148 detailed questions on behalf of recreational fishers and the businesses that serve them, and sought an urgent response. Those questions go to the heart of how the Department reached the position it has announced.
Yesterday, in that meeting, we asked for three things.
First, an extension of the consultation period into the new year. The material a submitter needs in order to respond properly has not been released, and the current closing date of 18 October falls at the start of the peak season, when the fishers, charter operators and retailers most affected are least able to prepare a considered response. We have asked for the deadline to be moved to 30 March 2027 so that genuine engagement can take place and be reported on.
Second, answers to our questions on the stock assessments, the modelling and the peer review. We have asked the Department to publish the model that converts a bag limit into a tonnage, the peer reviews that both drafts say were completed but neither makes public, and a clear reconciliation between the current assessments and the Department’s own published reports from three years ago, which classified both species as sustainable.
Third, detailed briefings on how the Department arrived at the position it announced. We have asked for these and the Department has agreed in principle to provide them. We welcome that, and we will work with the Department to settle the arrangements and take them up promptly.
We also put a practical point about boat limits.
A one-fish-per-boat limit does not reduce the number of people who want to go fishing. It changes how they go. Instead of four anglers sharing one boat, you get more boats on the water carrying fewer people each — more fuel burned, more pressure on ramps and moorings, more vessels offshore, and a greater safety exposure. It is a measure that risks achieving the opposite of what it intends, and we said so plainly.
Where AFTA stands.
We are not opposed to rebuilding fish stocks. Our members’ businesses depend on healthy fisheries, and nobody in the recreational fishing trade gains from a depleted one. What we are seeking is management built on evidence that can be examined, a burden shared fairly, and a process in which the people affected are genuinely part of the solution.
We found the Department willing to meet and to talk, and we intend to keep working with them on that basis.
AFTA will keep the fishing community informed as this progresses. We encourage every fisher and every business affected to read the drafts and make their own submission at haveyoursay.nsw.gov.au before 18 October. Individual submissions carry real weight — and if your business would be affected, say how, in dollars, in bookings and in staff.
There are two separate consultations, one per species:
- Snapper – https://www.haveyoursay.nsw.gov.au/snapper
- Yellowtail Kingfish – https://www.haveyoursay.nsw.gov.au/yellowtail-kingfish
The Hon. Bob Baldwin
Chair,
Australian Fishing Trade Association