THE establishment of a marine park in the Gulf of Carpentaria has become a matter of concern for the struggling community of Karumba, which relies heavily on the fishing industry for its existence.
Department of Environment, Water, Heritage and Arts (DEWHA) representatives and a representative from the Queensland Fishing Industry Association (QFIA) were in Karumba last week to gather information from people involved in the fishing insudtry.
DEWHA have established several areas of interest in relation to the declaration of the marine park, to be known as the Northern Bioregional Plan.
These areas have been ascertained from a CSIRO map of the sea floor in the Gulf.
DEWHA has refused to reveal which areas are of interest and those involved in the fishing industry fear their most productive fishing grounds will be taken from them.
QFIA representative, Winston Harris, was in Karumba to talk to fishermen and told the North Queensland Register there were fishermen who had invested millions of dollars in boats and equipment and stood to be severely disadvantaged if their fishing grounds were locked up in a marine park.
"DEWHA have got to understand that locking up fishing grounds will only increase imports and put further pressure on international fishing grounds," Mr Harris said.
He said the next step will be a risk assessment of fishermen's gear and the result of this will determine which areas will be allowed to be fished and how.
Fisherman Gary Ward said he could not understand why DEWHA refused to reveal which ares the Department were interested in and had not indicated any compensation for loss of income.
"In a community the size of Karumba if you remove twenty fishermen you also remove up to 40 kids from the schools and the flow-on effect will be devastating for this community," Mr Ward said.
He said that he had been led to believe the draft Marine Bioregional Plan will be in place by June this year. A formal public consultation period of at least 60 days will occur on the release of draft Marine Bioregional Plan
During this public consultation period stakeholders will be contacted and public meetings will be held where needed to facilitate and discuss feedback on the draft Plan. Views expressed by stakeholders will be considered before the final Marine Bioregional Plan is completed for each Region.
After the Minister has adopted the final Marine Bioregional Plans, the proposed network of new marine reserves will be declared through a separate process. This declaration process involves additional public consultation and another formal 60 day feedback period.
In the meantime the 87 net fishermen, 48 line fishermen and 60 crabbers can only ponder what the future of the fishing industry in the Gulf will be after the adoption of the Northern Marine Bioregional Plan.
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