In the past 20 years, many fisheries and aquaculture industries around the world have suffered major production losses through the impact of disease epidemics. To date, Australia has avoided many of these epidemics and retains a favourable disease status, which facilitates international trade and...

In January 2006, a previously unknown herpes‐like virus was identified as being the most likely cause of mass mortalities of abalone (Haliotis spp.) in a number of aquaculture farms in south‐west and central Victoria (Hardy‐Smith, 2006). The disease caused by the virus was named abalone viral...

By overgrazing seaweeds and sessile invertebrates, essentially back to bare rock, the advent of the long‐spined sea urchin Centrostephanus rodgersii in eastern Tasmanian waters poses a significant threat to the integrity, productivity and biodiversity of shallow (<40 m) rocky reef systems and the...

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are being proclaimed around the world with the stated primary purposes of enhancing fisheries stocks and/or conserving marine biodiversity. In Australia, in response to a joint State/Commonwealth agreement to establish a National Representative System of MPAs (NRSMPA)...