Guidelines for the Ecologically Sustainable Management of Fisheries -2007.

Under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC Act) the Australian Government, through the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, holds a legislative responsibility to ensure that all fisheries, from which product is exported, undergo assessment to determine the extent to which management arrangements will ensure the fishery is managed in an ecologically sustainable way. To assist in this assessment process the Australian Government developed this Guidelines for the Ecologically Sustainable Management of Fisheries (the Guidelines). These Guidelines aid in ensuring rigorous and transparent assessments are conducted in close cooperation with fisheries agencies, the fishing industry and the wider community. The Commonwealth holds as well a legislative responsibility to ensure that all Commonwealth managed fisheries undergo strategic environmental impact assessment before new management arrangements are brought into effect.
To satisfy the Commonwealth Government requirements for a demonstrably ecologically sustainable fishery, the fishery or fisheries (if a species is caught in more than one fishery), must operate under a management regime that meets Principles 1 and 2. The management regime must take into account arrangements in other jurisdictions, and adhere to arrangements established under Australian laws and international agreements. Principle 1 states that a fishery must be conducted in a manner that does not lead to over-fishing, or for those stocks that are over-fished, the fishery must be conducted such that there is a high degree of probability the stock(s) will recover (Objective 1: The fishery shall be conducted at catch levels that maintain ecologically viable stock levels at an agreed point or range, with acceptable levels of probability. Objective 2: Where the fished stock(s) are below a defined reference point, the fishery will be managed to promote recovery to ecologically viable stock levels within nominated timeframes). Principle 2 states that fishing operations should be managed to minimise their impact on the structure, productivity, function and biological diversity of the ecosystem (Objective 1.The fishery is conducted in a manner that does not threaten bycatch; Objective 2: The fishery is conducted in a manner that avoids mortality of, or injuries to, endangered, threatened or protected species and avoids or minimises impacts on threatened ecological communities species; Objective 3: The fishery is conducted, in a manner that minimises the impact of fishing operations on the ecosystem generally)
The management regime does not have to be a formal statutory fishery management plan as such, and may include non-statutory management arrangements or management policies and programs. The regime should: • be documented, publicly available and transparent; • be developed through a consultative process providing opportunity to all interested and affected parties, including the general public; • ensure that a range of expertise and community interests are involved in individual fishery management committees and during the stock assessment process; • be strategic, containing objectives and performance criteria by which the effectiveness of the management arrangements are measured; • be capable of controlling the level of harvest in the fishery using input and/or output controls; • contain the means of enforcing critical aspects of the management arrangements; • provide for the periodic review of the performance of the fishery management arrangements and the management strategies, objectives and criteria; • be capable of assessing, monitoring and avoiding, remedying or mitigating any adverse impacts on the wider marine ecosystem in which the target species lives and the fishery operates; and • require compliance with relevant threat abatement plans, recovery plans, the National Policy on Fisheries Bycatch, and bycatch action strategies developed under that policy