Public consultation has now closed. Thank you to everyone who spoke up!
The Tasmanian Government is considering a new sardine fishery that could allow industrial-scale fishing, putting dolphins, penguins and seabirds at serious risk, all for the sake of feeding unsustainable salmon farms.
Sardines are a critical food source at the base of the marine food web, and large purse-seine fisheries have a poor track record of managing bycatch and ecosystem impacts. Tasmanian waters have already seen multiple industrial fishing attempts, all failures — we must not repeat them.
A small-scale sardine fishery for human consumption could be sustainable. But the proposed scale would see thousands of tonnes of sardines out Tasmania’s ocean every year to fuel salmon farms, while drowning dolphins and starving penguins.
Add your name to call for strict caps that protect marine life and ensure truly sustainable fishing.