Australian Fishing Industry Disaster Appeal

Australian Fishing Trade Association (AFTA) has setup this GoFundMe page to assist in the natural disaster relief efforts that face our recreational fishing industry. There have been larges losses in life, wildlife and property resulting in many businesses facing financial hardship.

This fund, which AFTA is the trustee for, has been setup in conjunction with a committee of retail stores in the affected regions. It will be chaired by AFTA. Most importantly it will be the local businesses impacted by the disaster that will decide when and where the funds will be spent with a focus on helping individuals and businesses connected to the Australian Fishing Industry

The money raised will primarily be used to help promote tourism in affected areas and to support the economic recovery of these locations. Many are strong advocates of recreational fishing, which is encouraged, promoted and supported by these communities. The AFTA Natural Disaster committee will also offer advice and assistance to any fishing industry business or organisation to help them through the significant process of recovering their businesses as usual activities and getting back to what they love to do.

The funds will be distributed via recommendation from the committee or industry with no time limitations. The committee’s intent is to assist to process of getting the public back into and fishing in these regions, and to help all businesses supporting the Australian Recreational Fishing Industry. This may include tourism marketing assistance from the fund.

The best thing people can do after events like Australia's recent fires, ongoing drought or periodic floods is to help affected regions by spending our tourist dollars, in doing so, assisting in getting businesses and people back on their feet.

To show how important this is to AFTA, we are kicking the campaign off with a $20,000 donation directly into the trust account, the money raised here is on top of the $20,000.

We hope the Recreational Fishing Industry and the fishing enthusiasts of Australia will support the fishing community affected by the recent natural disasters. Please give generously to this important cause and ensure we build a Natural Disaster funding pool we can be proud of as an industry.

Regards

Michael Starkey
President
Australian Fishing Trade Association

Details on committee and money use:
1. Committee of up to 5 retail stores for each disaster region that will be chaired by AFTA
2. AFTA allocate money from the fund to this local committee as we see fit for the disaster
3. Money from GoFundme campaign will be held in a AFTA trust account previously setup until committee allocate spend.
4. The Committee then get 100% control, AFTA cannot overrule unless outside of guidelines
5. Guidelines for money spent:
- To be spent on recreational fishing tourism based activities, i.e. promoting fishing tournaments (not sponsoring directly), promoting family fishing in areas etc.
- To be spent on helping business to get grants or abnormal activities due to disasters, not going to the industry businesses but paying for assistance in paperwork etc if needed.
- Not to be given to individual businesses or clubs, money must be spent to get people to affected regions to spend their tourist dollars locally with the intent of fishing.