Maintaining Biodiversity in Sustainable Marine Fisheries. A Review and Scoping of Future Directions. Report Series 15. 1999

The development of sustainable marine fisheries will require acceptance that fisheries do affect some elements of marine biodiversity. The extent of the impacts of current fishing activities has not been measured fully, so decisions by the public about the acceptability of fishing in biodiversity terms are difficult and not well informed, and this uncertainty is creating a difficult commercial operating environment for fisheries. This review outlines the main biodiversity issues for marine fisheries, suggests some of the reasons why these matters have become issues and describes recent approaches to resolve them. The review identifies a range of new approaches and actions that will be needed to begin to identify and reduce the effects of fishing on biodiversity, improve the public's knowledge about the real impacts of fishing on biodiversity, and hence encourage an informed debate about the limits of acceptable change with respect to the impacts of fishing.

The report was prepared by the Environment and Access Committee of the Australian Seafood Industry Council and funded by Environment Australia.