Climate ready: identifying adaptation preparedness in Australia’s State fisheries

Project outline and objectives:

Long-term climate changes can have a range of potential effects, both positive and negative, on human economies and ecosystem services.

Currently, Australian state fisheries management plans and practices do not explicitly consider the effects of long-term climate change, and management options appropriate for climate change remain incompletely explored. This project will investigate the effectiveness and adaptive capacity of current fisheries management plans and practices in a climate change context, in each Australian state and in the Northern Territory.

More specifically, this project will:

• Review the climate-driven biological implications which intersect with Australian state fisheries;
• Review and analyse the focus of current Australian state fisheries management plans;
• Identify the perceptions of state fisheries managers and stakeholders, regarding necessary changes to current state management practices and plans;
• Model future outcomes of possible management adaptation options;
• Evaluate fisher acceptability of possible management adaptation options.