Sustainable fisheries

• Developing a bioregional framework to assist the management of marine resources
• Undertaking a risk assessment of each of the key ecological, economic, social and governance elements within the west coast bioregion
• Using modeling techniques to assist understand the impacts of different management actions on society, the economic situation and the ecology
• Analysing long term commercial fisheries datasets for their potential to monitor ecosystem change
• Creating monitoring systems to look at the effects of climate change and fishing on ecosystems and key habitats
• Identifying suitable sites to monitor long-term changes in ecosystems
• Assessing the value of long term datasets for measuring the impacts of climate change
• Providing advice on when fishing activities might have a significant impact on ecosystem structure
• Designing and establishing a monitoring and assessment program for new ‘closure’ and ‘nearby fished’ reference areas to examine the impacts of the western rock lobster fishery within deep-water regions
•  Monitoring changes in estuarine ecosystems of the Swan River, Peel-Harvey and Leschenault estuaries to ascertain the effects of climate change, human activity and biological factors
• Assessing how to monitor any potential impacts of fishing on key non-target species
• Developing new and more efficient methods to quantify recreational catches
• Improving our understanding of the main causes of changes in behavior by recreational fishers
• Assessing the social and economic impacts of policy changes on commercial and recreational fishers and the wider community  

Preliminary findings

• 'Component trees' were created to outline the large factors affecting the management of the west coast bioregion across all the ecological, social and economic elements of Ecosystem Based Fisheries Management (EBFM).
• Agreement wasreached with State Government agencies on the 13 key marine ecosystems within the west coast bioregion.
• A series of qualitative models was developed to outline the links between ecological, governance and economic elements of fisheries.
• Long-term trends about sea temperatures off the lower west coast of WA were determined, with increased knowledge about the frequency of ENSO events which may affect the populations of some species.
• Initial assessments of long-term commercial catch data for the west coast bioregion showed no evidence of significant changes in species composition or ecosystem structure.
• Species composition in the Peel-Harvey Estuary differs before and after the opening of the Dawesville Channel between the Peel Inlet and the Indian Ocean. An ecosystem model has been developed for both before and after the cut is examining possible reasons for these changes.
• The top four most abundant fish species in the Leschenault Estuary today were also the top four most abundant species in the 1990s.