QMS FAQs
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October 14, 2026
Not if the transition is done well. A well-designed transition plan would support commercial fishers to change their fishing practices to more selective methods. Some jobs may disappear however, the goal is to revitalise small-scale fishing operations in the regions so more jobs will be available to families and coastal communities. A thriving inshore fleet ... Read more.
October 14, 2026
Unlikely. The capture method only has a small influence on the retail price of fish. The majority of the retail sale price is influenced and captured by the quota owner, who then leases out the catch entitlement to fishers on the water. Those fishers make relatively low returns yet have higher costs in fuel, crew, ... Read more.
October 7, 2026
Unlikely, because fishers will be able to sell their fish directly to the public without having to pay lease costs to the quota landlord. Under the New Zealand Sport Fishing Council’s and LegaSea’s alternative policy, Rescue Fish, Ika Rauora, fish could become more affordable for everyday Kiwis. This is because it would remove quota ownership, ... Read more.
October 7, 2026
Under the Quota Management System, many inshore fishers lease their catching rights from quota owners, on the condition that they must sell their catch back to that quota owner. This leaves fishers little freedom to sell directly to the public. Unless they have a special permit, they can only sell up to 10 kilos of ... Read more.
October 7, 2026
A slipper skipper is a quota owner who never goes to sea and collects profits without ever touching the water. Instead of fishing themselves, they lease their catching rights to the fishers who do the hard work.
October 1, 2026
The Quota Management System (QMS) has concentrated and privatised control of our fisheries to a handful of major quota owners. This has had a detrimental impact on our fish, the fishers, Māori and our coastal communities. We need a system that removes private property rights, incentivises selective, low-impact fishing methods, and puts the health and ... Read more.
April 15, 2026
Over time, 98 species or species groups have been added to the QMS. For example, tarakihi was added to the QMS in 1986, kahawai in 2004. These are divided into 642 separate fish stocks i.e For snapper, there are six different snapper stocks across the country – SNA 1 (Northland, Hauraki Gulf, Bay of Plenty), ... Read more.
February 19, 2026
No. LegaSea and the New Zealand Sport Fishing Council have submitted many times that the deemed value system is not working. It’s not fair on smaller operators if larger operators, who hold a lot of Annual Catch Entitlement (ACE), will not release it. This encourages dumping, which is not good for the small-scale operator, nor ... Read more.
February 19, 2026
Deemed value penalties are supposed to be a deterrent to prevent commercial fishers from exceeding lawful catch limits. If these penalties are reduced, it will encourage ongoing catches beyond sustainable limits, weakening protections for fish stocks. The cost of commercial fishers catching more than they are legally allowed would instead be treated as an acceptable ... Read more.
February 19, 2026
No. The money collected from deemed value penalties goes into the Government’s Consolidated Fund. There is no requirement that deemed value revenue is reinvested into fisheries management expenses such as enforcement, monitoring, stock assessments and fisheries science.
