Condemnation of Queensland government Spanish mackerel quota reduction

He is one of a number of people sharply criticising the government's handling of the changes, which will see commercial quotas slashed from 570 tonnes to 165 tonnes a year, plus two three-week closed seasons in waters off the state's north starting in October, and two three-week closed seasons in southern waters starting in February 2023.

The news brought immediate condemnation from a collective including the Queensland Seafood Industry Association, the Gulf of Carpentaria Commercial Fishermen Association, the Moreton Bay Seafood Industry Association, the Fisherman's Portal Inc, and the Green Shirts Movement.

They say the 'catastrophic' announcement is a result of government mismanagement, saying that for some commercial fishers, their quota asset was their only source of superannuation.

As well as saying it will mean a larger influx of fish from other countries to meet demand, the group said it would mean spikes in purchase prices, quota purchases by investors not commercial fishers, and monopolisation and price gouging.

"As of this morning, if you owned an asset of $1m in Spanish mackerel quota, thanks to the Minister, your asset is now worth $200,000," its statement read.

Above all, the group says the underlying science behind the decision is flawed, a position that Mr Furner rejects.

"Nobody has come to us with better science on the level of Spanish mackerel stocks so doing nothing is not an option if we want our children and grandchildren to be able to fish for this species," he said.

The survival of the species has been the rationale given by the government for the changes, saying they would help restore depleted stocks and protect good jobs in the fishing industry for generations to come.

"The jobs that rely on Spanish mackerel could disappear entirely if we do not rebuild the stocks," Mr Furner said.

The fisheries collective said significant flaws pertaining to the use of data within the stock assessment had been exposed.

"Here's the 50 million dollar question - if they knew for at least a year that biomass figures were under 20 per cent, why didn't they close things down then, why did they let it keep going," QSIA CEO Eric Perez said. "The level of mismanagement by the department and the minister on this is at a whole new level."

One of the people who has undertaken a lot of the research on Spanish mackerel in Queensland waters over the past 15 years, Andrew Tobin said the writing has been on the wall for some time but said that commercial fishers had been blindsided by the announcement.

"There should have been a lot more dialogue in the lead-up to this," he said. "I'm not surprised the immediate reaction is one of disbelief and trying to pull the science apart."

Mr Tobin has a PhD in tropical fish biology and ecology, has fished commercially on and off since 1994, operates an award-winning fish and chip shop in Townsville, and has a purpose-built seafood truck that visits 32 towns in central and western Queensland.

The businesses combined use about 15 tonnes of Spanish mackerel fillet per year, and own 5t of the east coast Spanish mackerel quota.

Mr Tobin has undertaken five different Spanish mackerel projects since 1998 and said they were a reasonably easy fish to catch.

"They are creatures of habit - fishermen know, if they go to this place at this time it's highly likely they'll catch them," he said.

"We call that hyper-stability.

"They've been fished that hard, that long, that the cream has been knocked off the top."

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Mr Tobin said their spawning aggregation area off Townsville, which once provided 80pc of the total catch, was now providing 30pc.

"The 20 to 30 boats operating off Townsville in the 1930s got more fish then than the whole east coast is getting now," he said.

He attributed the disbelief in the stock status to a lack of people with a long timeline in the industry.

"Ten years ago there was research on spawning of various fish species and the prime candidate for closure then was Spanish mackerel," he said. "It's been known for some time. The government could have take steps to protect the species earlier and it didn't."

Mr Tobin had no time for one of the government's adjustments, that a new smartphone app for recreational fishers to voluntarily report their Spanish mackerel catches on the east coast, and shark depredation, will be developed.

"It's very likely, over the last two decades, that recreational fishermen have ramped up their catch, and we have no clue," he said.

"Most recreational fishers are for a form of licencing for the sector - the voluntary reporting of the catch is nonsensical at every level.

"It should be mandatory.

"It's the government's job to manage fisheries - they should stand up and do it."

Among the new rules is that recreational fishing for Spanish mackerel will be permitted for 46 weeks of the year with a bag limit of one per person or two per boat, which doesn't apply to licensed charter fishing trips.

The extended charter trip limit, which currently allows recreational fishers to take twice the in-possession limit for charter trips longer than 48 hours, will be removed from July 1, 2023.