Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones (centre) raised concerns about fish moving south due to warming waters. Photo / Supplied
By Lillian Hanly of RNZ
The Oceans and Fisheries Minister has raised concerns about fish “heading to Te Waipounamu” due to warming waters.
“In my lifetime, we’re seeing the drift into the South Island of fisheries resources that have been historically located in the North Island,” Shane Jones said.
The minister appeared before the Primary Production select committee for Scrutiny Week on Friday morning, and was asked about his “favourite topic, climate change” by Green MP Teanau Tuiono.
“I did anticipate this question,” Jones responded.
In October, Tuiono had asked Jones about the risk posed by warming oceans to the sustainability of the fishing industry after the Our Marine Environment 2025 report showed the rate of warming in ocean waters around New Zealand was 34 per cent faster than the global average warming rate.
Environment Minister Penny Simmonds also told Tuiono the report showed evidence that climate change was affecting primary industries including fisheries in a written parliamentary question.
The director of primary sector policy, Alastair Cameron, said during the hearing some fisheries were moving further south into “cooler waters”.
The Ministry for Primary Industries provided more information to RNZ, indicating marine heatwaves - that impact fish stocks - were becoming increasingly common in recent years. The ministry said it was a complex and developing issue and the exact way fish stocks were impacted was not fully yet understood.
MPI explained warmer waters meant species such as snapper and John Dory may experience “shifts in their home range and overall productivity”.
Cameron said MPI considers the evidence and information about what impacts climate change could have on warming seas and the effect on fisheries and their distribution.
One of the responses to that work was looking at the regulatory systems, he said.
“How do we make those a bit more agile, a bit more flexible, to account for the changes that we might see.”
Jones said the fishing industry had asked and he had instructed officials to look at how to “cope” when big fishing boats were catching fish that was never there historically, and catching more because of the technology they use.
“If you’re catching a type of fish that’s historically not been present in a net, and you’re not able to bring it back to shore in a form that generates a good economic return, you are still being charged, through deemed value, a levy for having caught that fish.
“Now they’re not targeting it. It’s present because of changing water temperatures.”
He said smart regulatory responses that reflected oceanic changes were needed.
“We’ve got to have practical solutions, because the fish is heading to Te Waipounamu, e hoa,” Jones said.
He also joked he now needed “certain people in Te Tai Tokerau to follow the fish in the South Island”.
After the hearing, RNZ asked if the minister was alarmed to hear fish were migrating, to which Jones replied it was reflective of his “favourite subject, climate change – not”.
He said he was concerned if it imposed unnecessary burdens on the industry and they did not have the ability to deal with it.
Asked if the news gave him pause for thought around issues such as mining, he said he responded to the issue by requiring officials to “derive regulated responses on behalf of the state”.
“I don’t want to close down the economy to keep a few shrill voices in Dunedin happy.”
During the hearing, Jones also discussed the issue of public favour when it came to managing primary industries.
He spoke about an upcoming decision that was “more than likely” to stop the access of recreational and commercial people in New Zealand from taking crayfish from the entirety of Northland’s east coast.
“Those are very, very big decisions to make. But I’m making it.”
He said officials had used science and spoken to the public who had said “enough is enough. We have mined this resource to such a point it can’t survive if we stay on the current trajectory.
“These decisions, they have to find public favour,” said Jones, but acknowledged later the public was not “of one mind”.
He said the Government had “shifted the pendulum” so climate change was no longer regarded in quite the “polarising, ideological way” it had been.
-RNZ