Ignore Australia Institute fish farm study, say salmon lobbyists

Salmon Tasmania chief executive officer Luke Martin suggested the nationwide poll by the Australia Institute was "garbage" and should be ignored.

Australia Institute in July conducted a poll on attitudes toward the salmon industry and the decline in numbers of endangered Macquarie Harbour Maugean skate, which activists claim is a result of fish farming in the area.

According to the poll, 61 per cent of Australians supported an end to fish farming in Macquarie Harbour if it put Maugean skate at risk of extinction.

The majority of respondents in each large state supported stopping fish farming if it put the skate at risk of extinction, with support ranging from 66 per cent in NSW to 58 per cent in Victoria, according to the poll results.

Less than 20 per cent of respondents in all states opposed stopping fish farming where it puts the endangered Maugean skate at risk of extinction.

Eloise Carr, director of the Australia Institute Tasmania, said she wrote to Federal Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek requesting a review of the 2012 decision allowing large-scale fish farming in the harbour.

"Scientific evidence discovered since then should result in revoking that decision. The science is clear: we now know that fish farms are having a significant impact on the skate," Ms Carr said.

Research by the University of Tasmania's Institute of Marine and Antarctic Studies (IMAS) published earlier this year documented a 47 per cent drop in Maugean skate numbers in Macquarie Harbour between 2014 and 2021.

Dr David Moreno, lead researcher on the IMAS skate monitoring project, suggested various human activities might be to blame, including salmon farming, commercial and recreational fishing, and hydro electricity production affecting river flows into the harbour.

Activists have called for the immediate closure of Macquarie Harbour fish farms.

"When fish are sent to market, pens should not be restocked. When environmental licenses run out on 30 November this year, they should not be renewed," Ms Carr said.

"This needs the government to intervene, and Tasmanians support the government in doing so. But the Tasmanian government cannot be trusted to show the leadership this situation demands."

Mr Martin said the Australia Institute needed to do better.

"The Maugean Skate are too important for wasting money on simplistic push polling," he said.

"To date any real action to save it from extinction, including identifying the risk and funding research, has come from the salmon industry".

The industry last week pledged $750,000 in research funding towards Maugean skate.

"Perhaps the Australia Institute could join us in contributing to fund IMAS' research rather than wasting money on politically motivated push polling," Mr Martin said.

"Tasmania's leading election and polling analyst Kevin Bonham recently referred to polling like this by activist groups as "garbage" and called for it to be ignored".

In response, Ms Carr said the Australia Institute was a "non-partisan, independent" think tank.

"We are a member of the Australian Polling Council and regularly conduct polls to assess attitudes towards public policy issues.

"Stopping fish farming is the key policy response available to save the endangered Maugean skate and our polling shows a majority of Australians support this policy response.

"The salmon industry's money would be better spent on removing their infrastructure and fish from the harbour to protect the skate from extinction. That's the best use of the money for the skate."

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