Port Phillip Bay Fishery Catch and Effort Data by 5-Minute Grid Cells

Victorian Fisheries Authority provides a geospatial layer defining the area cells used to record commercial fishery catch and effort data for Port Phillip Bay. The data has been collected since April 1998 and is used by the Port Phillip Bay, Port Phillip Bay (Mussel Bait), and Port Phillip Bay (Purse Seine) fisheries. The layer is based on divisions of 5 minutes of latitude by 5 minutes of longitude.

Use Cases

• Mapping commercial fishing intensity based on the defined 5-minute by 5-minute grid cells.
• Analyzing spatial and temporal trends in catch and effort for specific fisheries (e.g., Mussel Bait, Purse Seine).
• Supporting fisheries management decisions by providing a standardized spatial framework for data recording since 1998.
• Integrating catch data with other marine spatial datasets using the consistent geospatial cell boundaries.

Strengths

• Data collection has a long temporal scope, starting in April 1998.
• Provides a standardized spatial framework based on 5-minute latitude/longitude divisions.
• Explicitly supports multiple specific fisheries within Port Phillip Bay.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data may reflect geographic and temporal bias inherent to the specific commercial fisheries reporting.

Provenance

Source

Victorian Fisheries Authority

Collection Method

Recorded catch and effort data from commercial fisheries, structured into a standardized geospatial grid.

Time Range

Since April 1998

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-09 07:17:21.159358; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Port Phillip Bay, Victoria, Australia