Re-thinking recreational fishing - how a natural disaster presents insights and opportunities for achieving sustainability and equity objectives

Paua (abalone) are a treasured natural resource that supports a recreational fishery worth $2 million annually to the local economy of the Kaiko over bar ura district in New Zealand. From 2016, the fishery was closed for 5 years in response to widespread mortality caused by co-seismic uplift in the 7.8 M-w Kaiko over bar ura earthquake. The fishery re-opened in 2021 for three months with a recreational fishing allocation of 5 tonnes. We constructed scenario models informed by fishing pressure observations and show that this catch target was severely exceeded (by a factor of similar to 9). We then evaluated alternative management settings involving daily bag limit (DBL) adjustments and temporal controls on the open season. Only the most drastic modelled scenarios could achieve the 5 t allocation with similar levels of daily fishing effort showing the need for a greater focus on fishing effort to achieve sustainable management. Severely reduced DBLs (1-2 paua) were required in all scenarios suggesting a need for significant departure from this management focus since very low DBL settings force poor cost-return ratios on fishers. Instead, temporal controls that shift opening times away from high visitation periods pro-vide a means of maintaining modest DBLs outside of longer-term protected areas. These seasonal timing strategies can also support a greater proportion of the harvest accruing to local fishers thereby influencing benefit-sharing aspects of the recreational fishery. We discuss insights for equitable solutions to potential influxes of fishing effort and highlight the opportune aspects of disaster recovery contexts for conceiving and implementing new policy directions.

Automated summary

This study focuses on the paua (abalone) fishery in the Kaiko Over Bar Ura district in New Zealand, which is an important component of the local economy. The fishery was closed for 5 years due to mortality caused by an earthquake, and reopened in 2021. The study finds that the catch target was severely exceeded, highlighting the need to focus on fishing effort for sustainable management. Adjusting daily bag limits and temporal controls on the open season can help achieve a balance.