The example of the Great Barrier Reef demonstrates that marine ecosystems can regenerate if the necessary environmental protection measures are put in place. In the protected areas of the reef, the fish population has increased by between 30% and 75% in only two years.

- a part of a catchment area from the sources of the waterways to a natural or artificial barrier preventing fish migrating from downstream of that barrier.

The association's concerns include: the risk of disease transfer from net pens to wild stocks; risk of disease introduction from the importation of exotic species' eggs and milt; the increased risk of the transfer of common diseases among domestic species; the loss of access to traditional, commercial, recreational, and aboriginal fishing grounds; pollution of habitat from fish sewage; government funding and subsidies for aquaculture resulting in fewer financial and human resources available for research assessment and the management of wild fish resources; injury, stress, and mortality to marine animals caused by net entanglement and the use of acoustic deterrent devices; the impacts on wild resources from drugs and pesticides used ...[+++]on aquaculture sites; genetic interaction between wild and escaped farm fish; competition for food between wild and escaped farm fish; the losses of wild fish, especially small juveniles consumed by net pen fish; the loss of juvenile habitat; parasite infestation; the presence of farms altering the availability of natural plankton and feeds and creating a hostile environment for wild fish larvae and juvenile fish; increased disease susceptibility due to increased stress levels among pen fish; risk to human health from increased utilization of antibiotics and other drugs used in farm fish; and the risk and impact of farm fish becoming resistant to antibiotics.