Australian Fisheries Management Authority

Seventeen illegal fishers from two separate Indonesian vessels faced Darwin Local Court this week, charged with Commonwealth fishing offences.

Justin Bathurst from the Australian Fisheries Management Authority says one crew was caught with more than 50 shark fins.

Those 17 were from two separate apprehensions of two illegal foreign fishing boats, both Indonesian vessels.

13 crew were located on board one vessel and four crew aboard the other vessel.

So the next year, instead of taking two fish out, you might be able to take four out because the exponential growth of the fish.

So the Australian government set targets when they issued a quota management system and they set targets and said, well, this particular species, after research from CSIRO, so CSIRO does all the research on Australian fisheries and fish stocks on behalf of the Australian Fisheries Management Authority, which is the regulator.

they basically count the amount of fish in the sea using various scientific methods.

And every year they'll come out and say, this is the amount of fish that you can take out of the pond and this is what you have to leave in the pond.