Northland Regional Recreational Forum – First Meeting

20 October 2005

Venue: Settlers Hotel, Whangarei

General Comments

Forum participants have a wide range of experience. Some are already familiar with Ministry processes, others have a commercial fishing background, and some have been involved in fisheries research. Most members are representatives of a recreational fishing organisation. It is very positive that forum members are willing to be involved. Most participants wanted to ensure the outcomes of their involvement will be identifiable, so that their participation is warranted.

Further forum members may be required to better represent some areas, particularly north of Bay of Islands and on the west coast.

Agenda Item: Purpose & Objectives of the Forum 

Initial objectives:

To improve consultation with the recreational sector;

• To build positive relationships that encourage information sharing;
• To enhance the ability of recreational fishers to participate in fisheries management decision-making;
• To help identify and resolve regional fisheries management issues.

Topics discussed in relation to forum objectives and purpose:

• Participants want to be convinced about the worth of the forums;
• It is important to make sure the information and opinions offered at the forums makes its way upwards (ie to Wellington/managers);
• Participants emphasised the importance of communication – both at an early stage (i.e. 6 months to a year before an initial position paper is written, members would like to know what issues are being raised, what will be reviewed); and of results (e.g. of research projects, changes to regulations);
• Agreement with the objective of getting more information out to recreational fishers, but more discussion required about whose responsibility it is to disseminate information, and the best means of doing so;
• Participants wanted input into management through the forum (rather than just being ‘consulted’). For example, this could occur by incorporating issues the forum raises into Ministry processes such as prioritisation of stocks or regulations for review in the sustainability round;
• Overall, participants didn’t want the forums to be politicised, or used as a political response to ‘image’ problems such as the kahawai court case. Instead, they were looking for genuine Ministry desire to engage.

Action:

• Forum members may wish to further consider whether they are comfortable with the objectives that were outlined at the forum, or whether the terms of reference need to be re-examined (terms of reference are in the final section of your folder).

Agenda Item: Membership of the Forum

Participants agreed that fishers from further north than Bay of Islands weren’t represented very well on the forum at present. Some members took away membership forms, and all agreed to think about who else could get involved.

Action:

• Forum members and MFish seek additional members to improve coverage of forum.

Agenda Item: Roles & Expectations

Initial expectations of forum members:

Work with MFish to create a meeting environment that encourages sharing of information;

• Identify local issues;
• Accurately report your fishing communities’ viewpoints;
• Nominate topics for discussion/education at forums;
• Actively share what is learnt at the forums with your fishing communities;
• Encourage your fishing communities to participate in decision-making processes.

The main point to come out here was that members are happy to bring issues to the forum on behalf of their fishing communities, but do not think it is their responsibility to communicate back to those communities. That responsibility remains with MFish. Having said that, forum members will act as conduits for information (but not as advocates of particular MFish policies).

More thought needs to be given to how best to reach recreational fishers. Some forum members thought it would be useful to use existing fishing publications better – for example have an MFish page in every fishing publication. Some forum members also thought updates in club newsletters would be useful (although others noted that few people may read such newsletters).

Actions:

• It might be useful to make ‘communication’ an agenda item to discuss at the next meeting, so forum members can put forward and discuss ideas in a more structured way. If possible, it would be good for a communications team member to attend also.
• MFish continue to work internally on developing easily understandable summaries of key reviews and decisions.

Agenda Item: Administration Processes

Forum members agreed 4.30pm on a weeknight is a good time to meet. It is likely to be hard to find a date that suits most forum members for the next meeting in January/February. There was support for having alternate meetings in the Bay of Islands.

Action:

• Agree on meeting date to occur in late January/early February.

Agenda Item: Regional Update: Members

Topics that forum members raised in their regional updates included:

• Concern about pelagic sharks (lack of sharks very noticeable, also in regard to shark finning);
• Concern about the broadbill fishery (spatial separation of commercial and non-commercial fishers suggested for pelagic fisheries in some areas e.g. Three Kings. Voluntary closures considered not to be working because of new entrants to fishery);
• Heavy recreational/tourist pressure in the Bay of Islands leads to specific problems that need to be addressed in that area, preferably via a multi-sector approach (including not just fishing pressure, but also noise pollution from tourist boats; and land development).
• Also concerns that various overlapping or potentially competing management measures are being discussed for the Bay, including a mataitai application in its early stages, and a marine national park being discussed. All sectors need to be involved in any management approach. The public need to have better information about customary tools;
• Recreational/charter boat pressure on kingfish (particularly Bay of Islands);
• General impression that snapper fishing has improved (with some disagreements) – although a large number of undersize fish is also apparent;
• Limited availability of kahawai;
• Limited larger fish of various species including snapper, kahawai, trevally;
• Concern about hapuka fishery.

Actions:

• Forum members consider whether the attached sheet would be useful to record members’ updates, to circulate before the meeting.
• MFish to discuss with forum members which of the issues need further discussion, and organise for subsequent meeting. MFish to provide further information as required.

Agenda Item: Regional Update: MFish

Because of time constraints, there wasn’t much scope for forum members to discuss issues they were interested in, or to provide comment.

Feedback on sustainability round:

• West coast snapper (SNA 8): insufficient consultation, especially on reducing the bag limit. Publicity needs to be put in place before the bag limit is changed;
• Proportional reduction discussion still needs to occur.

Actions:

• MFish to provide further information on any questions members have about the update bulletin. MFish to provide extra copies of any of the summaries if members want to distribute them more widely.

Agenda Item: Other Business

‘Other business’ items were captured throughout the meeting, including:

MFish process issues:

• Making sure forum’s issues get raised upwards;
• Better ways of using existing sources of information about recreational fishing e.g. recreational fishing club records, competition records;
• Accessibility of information – making sure documents are more understandable e.g. use of abbreviations, jargon, providing definitions of words. Support for summary documents like those done for this year’s sustainability round;
• Communications/publicity e.g. pamphlets about management proposals at boat ramps; fishing newsletters; media (fishing/mainstream);
• Timeframes for consultation;
• Help with submission writing for recreational fishers;
• HFOs deserve more recognition of their work by way of an honorarium;

Potential topics for further discussion or provision of more information at future forum meetings:

• More information wanted on relative proportions of commercial and recreational fishing for hapuka;
• Management of pelagic sharks, including shark finning;
• Management of the broadbill fishery;
• Opportunities for local management tools;
• Customary tools e.g. mataitai in Bay of Islands;
• Update on the Hokianga Accord (a non-commercial forum that encompasses both customary and recreational fishing interests);
• Recreational scallop dredging in the Bay of Islands;
• Impact of tannelised posts from oyster farms on surrounding environ including fish;
• Potential research project to look into impact of boat noise on fisheries.

Actions:

• MFish to consider process issues that have been raised, and discuss with appropriate staff e.g. communications team. MFish to discuss with forum members which of the issues raised need further discussion, organise for subsequent meeting, and provide further information as required.

Other:

Forum members would like to share information with other forums. There was also interest in forum members attending some other meetings as appropriate (e.g. if SNA 8 was being discussed, where 3 forums have an interest in it).

Public release of names was not discussed with forum members.

Actions:

• MFish to confirm whether other forums are interested in sharing meeting notes etc.
• Forum members to confirm whether they are happy for their names and contact details to be made publicly available (e.g. published on MFish website).