Climate Change affecting Tasmanian fisheries

MELBOURNE: Climate change will happen at an accelerated rate in Southeast Australia, with Tasmanian waters predicted to rise 2.5°C by 2050 and have large impacts for the fishing industry.

Tasmanian hot spot. Graphic courtesy of Alistair Hobday

Tasmaia currently produces more than half of Australia’s seafood, and such an increase in water temperatures are predicted to affect rock lobsters (crayfish). The Tasmanian rock lobster fishery is the state’s second most important wild harvest fishery has an estimated value of $72 million.

“Fisheries and aquaculture really see themselves on the front line of change,” said marine researcher Alistair Hobday, from Australia’s national science agency, the CSIRO.

Waters warming at three times global average
Hobday and his team have spent the last two years building a computer simulation model known as SE Atlantis, and presented the results at the Climate Change Research Strategy for Primary Industries (CCRSPI) conference in Melbourne, Australia.

Read more of this article at COSMOS online.