ARFF's Tackle Box project is about to engage with the Australian fishing community
by Recreational Fishing Alliance of NSW 12 May 2021 22:03 UTC
Through grant funding from the Australian Government, the Australian Recreational Fishing Foundation successfully completed engaging 19 fishing events throughout Australia utilising the innovative Tackle Box app.
This pilot project has been undertaken to show that there is a growing desire from the recreational fishing community to modernise how we collect information to help all of us make better evidence-based decisions.
By breaking free of the archaic data collection practices, implement new practices, while keeping our fishing values and principles that we hold dear, all Australian's will soon have a chance to engage in rec fishing citizen science through the different programs ARFF is working to develop with its member organisations including the RFA.
ARFF's new communications specialist Bonita "Snagger" Brown is about to engage the Australian rec fishing community over the next couple of months through a tailored campaign which will highlight the great work the project has done and where it is heading next.
ARFF's executive officer Adam Martin says "you wouldn't buy a house unseen, not knowing its condition, would you? Then why do we continue to make decisions about what is happening below the waterline without perform a real-world condition audit of what actually exists in the form of habitat and fish stocks? We also need to understand how our own fishing behaviour interacts with the fish and habitat so we can make superior evidence-based decision making through co-management arrangements."
Martin continues "Gone are the days of taxpayers having to foot the bill for incredibly expensive research programs and enormous vessels that are already fitted out with obsolete technology and processes that belong in the 20th century.
Community driven programs that give the community stewardship using next generation technology that removes a great deal of human error and provides rigorous data collection using swarm style campaigns is the only way to move forward compared to very expensive to operate large and slow single vessels."
Stay tuned as ARFF helps the NSW community get engaged in citizen science at levels we need to see so we can make much better evidence-based decision making.