Busselton, Royal Palms Hotel, 2 Albert Street Busselton.     6.30 - 8.30pm Wednesday 4th August 2010

South West recreational fishers will have a chance to be briefed and provide feedback, on catch share allocations for West Coast demersal scalefish, at meetings next week.

WA’s West Coast Bioregion extends from north of Kalbarri to east of Augusta and there are about 200 species, including some of the State’s most iconic finfish, which are subject to a range of management rules to ensure sustainability of the stocks.

The Integrated Fisheries Allocation Advisory Committee (IFAAC) has been given the task of developing recommendations on sharing these valuable community resources.

The first South West public meeting will be held at the Royal Palms Hotel, 2 Albert Street Busselton, from 6.30pm to 8.30pm next Wednesday (4 August 2010).

A second meeting will be held at the Sanctuary Golf Club, Lot 100 Old Coast Road Pelican Point Bunbury, from 6.30pm to 8.30pm on Thursday (5 August 2010).

The issues are complex and interested parties are urged to attend the meetings, which are facilitated by Rechfishwest. There will be time for questions to be answered.

Meetings have already been held in other major centres of the West Coast Bioregion to discuss how IFAAC has proposed to allocate species, such as dhufish, pink snapper and baldchin groper, between the commercial and recreational fishing sectors.

Recreational fishers have taken part in meetings in the Mid-West, the Metropolitan area and Mandurah and they have helped in providing useful feedback to the independent advisory committee on its draft allocation report.

IFAAC has proposed two-thirds of the resource be allocated to the commercial sector and one third to recreational fishers. There are additional recommendations to ensure the dhufish take does not increase beyond historical proportions for the sectors. The committee is seeking feedback on its draft recommendations and inviting interested parties to submit their formal responses by 30 September 2010.

The WA Fishing Industry Council is conducting separate meetings for the commercial sector, to seek their input on the proposed allocation.

Copies of the consultation paper (Integrated Fisheries Management Draft Allocation Report – West Coast Demersal Scalefish – FMP 237) will be available at the meeting, or it can be downloaded from Fisheries’ website at www.fish.wa.gov.au. Look for the Integrated Fisheries Management tab on the home page menu.

Department of Fisheries Media Release 30 July 2010