New Zealand’s fishing industry has welcomed an increase to this season''s hoki quota as well as the reopening of an orange roughy fishery on the north west of the South Island, which closed a decade ago due to dwindling stocks.
The Ministry of Fisheries has added 10,000 tonnes to the hoki catch, which could be worth $15 million (€11.2 million) to the industry.
Good fisheries management has yielded results for the economy and the environment, said New Zealand Seafood Industry Council chief executive Peter Bodeker.
“We’ve seen some increases in catch limits and some reductions. The good news from our point of view is that the minister has used the best available science to set these limits, so we can be confident the changes will keep our fisheries sustainable,” Bodeker said.
The minister’s decision to reopen the orange roughy fishery on the Challenger Plateau, west of the south island, was “an irrefutable endorsement of the success of New Zealand’s fisheries management system”, he said.
“Here we have a fishery which was closed for 10 years to let it rebuild that can now be sustainably reopened with a small commercial catch limit. It’s proof that even a long-lived species like orange roughy can recover if it is managed with a combination of caution and good scientific information.”
Meanwhile, efforts to rebuild the orange roughy fishery on the Chatham Rise have resulted in the third of three reductions to the catch limit.
“Industry welcomes this reduction because sustainability is the bedrock of our business. The seafood industry contributes $1.4 billion (€1 billion) to New Zealand’s economy and keeps more than 26,000 in work. We couldn’t do that if we didn’t look after the resource.”
The Challenger Plateau orange roughy fishery (called ORH7A) has been closed since October 2000. It will reopen with a limit of 500 tonnes.
The catch limit for the Chatham Rise orange roughy fishery (called ORH3B) will be reduced from 8,350 to 4,840 tonnes, the third in a three-step phased reduction.
These changes to orange roughy catch limits are part of a suite of announced changes and will come into force at the beginning of the new fishing year on 1 October.
