Surfers in Tasmania have added their voices to the growing calls to reform Tasmania’s salmon industry.
Members of Surfing Tasmania are calling for a moratorium on biomass increases on local salmon leases until baseline science is completed and until authorities have introduced a regulation that requires salmon farmers to report white pointer shark sightings.
The group is concerned about the levels of fish excrement and a “lack of research” into increased sightings of white pointer sharks.
But its president, Mick Lawrence, laments that surfers “are treated differently” from other users of the oceans.
“Fish farmers don’t even acknowledge us as stakeholders despite being around for 30 years longer than them. We have no objections to a world’s best practice industry, unfortunately with over 160 concerns raised by the upper house, we’re still a long way from that,” he said in a statement on Thursday.
