Professional Skipper - Free Sample issue (July/Aug 2011)

FEEDS GRASS ROOTS FISHING CONFERENCE BY R LEA CLOUGH T he imminent merger of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the Ministry of Fisheries will create problems with the public/private split of interests and costs. These will have to be worked on as the new unified ministry evolves, the Minister of Fisheries, the Hon Phil Heatley, said in his address as keynote speaker at the annual conference of the New Zealand Federation of Commercial Fishermen. A reform of rules and regulations is to be carried out to reduce, consolidate and simplify these. The annual conference was held at the Armitage Hotel, Tauranga from May 12-14. Welcoming delegates, the Mayor of Tauranga, Stuart Crosby, spoke of the progress of Tauranga and its dependence on the port. He then declared the conference open. Brian Kiddie of the Bay of Plenty Fishermen's Association spoke about their port problems, primarily poor facilities for the commercial fishery. In common with many other fishing communities, issues were focused on actual or threatened lack of access to grounds, through marine protected areas, mataitai, aquaculture and oil exploration. Heatley's speech was moderately upbeat. He indicated there was room for increases in some total allowable commercial catches. He also spoke on New Zealand's high-sustainability reputation, contrasting it with appalling European Union practices (a graphic illustration of these was the footage seen on television cook Rick Stein's programme – where the skipper of a British trawler was shown being forced to dump cases of headed and gutted monkfish because he could not get quota to cover it). The minister touched on the "race for space" in inshore fisheries. He said he has to explain to his Cabinet colleagues the complexities of competing demands on coastal waters. He expects the burden of the observer programme to remain steady. A petition seeking a review of crewing of foreign charter vessels is before Parliament. He stated unequivocally that foreign crewing of inshore vessels will not happen while he is minister. The president of the federation, Doug Saunders-Loder, opened question time by noting the minister's comments on improving financial returns for the industry. He inferred from Heatley's remarks that he was willing to re-examine observer coverage of vessels. He put in a plea to look again at the attitude towards anecdotal evidence, citing the years of knowledge and experience of fishermen. "Everyone has a story to tell." This writer took up the theme of anecdotal evidence, describing 22 Professional Skipper July/August 2011 r it as a two-edged sword. If the words of those with their feet on the deck is to be dismissed, so should the words of those who worked in offices and had never set foot on a working deck. Alternatively, the words of those who knew what they were talking about should be accorded more weight. Currently, there was a move to impose observer coverage on the Chatham Islands rock lobster fishery for the dubious purpose of quantifying shag mortality. It was based on very shaky grounds and would be resisted. The minister would not be drawn on these topics. Another issue was the exclusion of fishermen from a rig fishery by the set net bans on the western coast of the North Island. Heatley said there would be no compensation or subsidy, but he also indicated that an increase in snapper TACC would alleviate the problem. When it was pointed out that it would only make the quota owners richer and not help the catcher much, he replied, "The world is not perfect." The minister made a significant announcement during discussion on mataitai. He has instructed his staff to stop sending back mataitai applications to iwi when the answer should clearly be "No!" They are not to try to get these applications modified into a more acceptable form, wasting time and resources. He wants his staff to concentrate on the difficult and complex applications. Malcolm Pinkney, of Hokianga, asked about the set net ban versus other harmful activities such as seismic surveys, tidal power and ironsand extraction. Heatley replied that he could not do anything about those, but he could about set netting. The chief executive officer of SEAFIC, Peter Bodeker, shared some observations after just under one year in the job. He compared the seafood industry with the other big export performers – dairy, kiwifruit, wine and meat – showing seafood had the worst factors, these being lowest cooperation, investment and returns, despite comprising 10 percent of world export trade. Bodeker was followed by other SEAFIC speakers. Policy manager Nici Gibbs spoke on "Managing our own ship", exploring how the industry could increase its autonomy in managing fisheries. Science manager David Middleton spoke on "Fisheries science – our way". The last item was a video from Professor Ray Hilborn of the University of Washington. A frequent visitor and science provider to New Zealand, he had some controversial views on sustainability of fish stocks.

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