Coral Sea marine protected areas: our gift to Asian fishermen.

• Author: Starck, Walter
• Pages: 25(6)

Marine protected areas (MPAs) are a current fad in marine resource management. Where renewable resources are over-exploited, some form of restriction is desirable. MPAs are but one of a range of restrictive measures that may be employed. Whether they offer any advantage or disadvantage to closed seasons, catch limits, limited licensing or other restrictions has not been properly assessed. At this time, they have not been found to be an important management tool in any of the world's well-managed fisheries.

As one might expect, there is evidence that in heavily exploited regions there are more and bigger fish in protected areas, and some of the protected population will spill over into the immediately adjacent area. However, this spill-over effect has only been noted over a distance of a few hundred metres. In this respect, numerous small reserves might be more effective than fewer larger ones, although this is contrary to the currently popular claim that MPAs need to be much larger.

One would also reasonably expect that the increased populations and spillover effects would be proportional to fishing pressure. Where only light pressure exists, not much effect should be expected; and indeed, this has been what one finds with most closed reefs on the Great Barrier Reef. This is unsurprising as the average fishing harvest rate for the Great Barrier Reef is less than a quarter of 1 per cent of the conservative estimate of the sustainable limit for reef fisheries.

From a resource management standpoint a key question is whether the increase in catch outside a reserve is greater than what is lost by having the reserve. Or, to put it differently, is it better to protect a portion of an area and concentrate impact on the remainder or to spread the harvest over the whole and limit it by other forms of restriction? At present there is no reason or evidence to expect this, and the establishment of extensive MPAs amounts to large scale environmental meddling with no clear idea of efficacy or consequences. Ironically, this is in direct disregard of the precautionary principle so often cited as justifying such measures.

Most importantly, there is no urgent need for extensive MPAs in Australia. We can afford the time to learn more and know what we are doing instead of imposing costly and unnecessary measures that may create more problems than they address.

Does Australia suffer from over-fishing?

Few people truly appreciate the overall low level of fishing pressure in Australia. We have the third largest exclusive economic zone (EEZ) area in the world and the second largest shelf area. On a per capita basis we have by far the largest fishery area of any nation. We also have the most heavily regulated fisheries in the world with the highest management costs per unit of production. Despite widespread concern about over-fishing, it simply isn't happening. Our already pathetically small fishing industry is rapidly declining as the burden of regulation drives existing fishermen to quit and deters new ones from entering. The end result is the world's lowest fishery harvest rate at only about 1/30 of the global average, and 70 per cent of the seafood we consume must be imported.

These imports currently add some $1.8 billion to our annual trade deficit. We are selling off non-renewable mineral resources to buy a renewable one we have in abundance. In addition, we...