Commercial Fishing
The commercial fishing catch and effort data is collected through the commercial logbooks program. Information from 1990 onwards is presented in QFish. This includes data on species catch and fishing effort for various Queensland fisheries which can be refined for a specified time period, species, fishing method and/or region. This summary data contains fishing information up to three months ago which is refreshed from the master database every week.
Fisheries Queensland provides publicly available reports on fishery ecological assessment, stock assessments, species stock status and fishery updates. For more information on commercial and recreational monitoring and reporting, please visit the Fisheries data & reports page.
Recreational Fishing
The recreational fishing information available on QFish is a subset of the expanded estimates from data collected during three independent 12 month surveys. The earlier survey is the National Recreational and Indigenous Fishing Survey (NRIFS) which commenced in 2000, and the two more recent are the Statewide Recreational Fishing Survey (SWRFS) which commenced in 2010 and 2013. The estimates relate to Queenslanders fishing in Queensland. They do not include fishing activity by people from interstate or overseas. These surveys used very similar methods so the results are comparable.
For more details on the Statewide Recreational Fishing Survey methods and results, please read the detailed report available here.
Shark Control Program
The responsibility for managing the Queensland Shark Control Program on behalf of the Queensland government lies with the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (DAF). The aim of the Program is to reduce the chance of shark attacks on humans by removing large and potentially dangerous sharks from 85 popular beaches along the Queensland coastline (for more information visit the website at www.daf.qld.gov.au). The government maintains a strong commitment to maintaining the safety of beach users in Queensland.