DEPARTMENT OF FISHERIES ANNUAL REPORT TO THE ...

SUMMARy OF THE yEAR � FINANCIAL OvERvIEw
financial Position
The Statement of Financial Position shows what the
Department owns (assets) as well as owes (liabilities).
This is useful in assessing and analysing how good the
Department is at managing its resources.
Financial position – five-year trend
Figure 14 shows the value of the assets and liabilities,
and net assets of the Department over the last five
financial years.
The net assets of the Department is the difference
between total assets and total liabilities and represents
the residual interest in the assets after deducting the
probable call on these resources, represented by liabilities.
Under the Fisheries Adjustment Schemes Act 1987
the Department has the capacity to reduce effort in a
fishery by acquiring commercial fishing authorisations.
The Act allows the Department to borrow money from
the Treasurer to purchase the authorisations. The
fishers remaining in the relevant fisheries are required
to pay additional fees to recover the outlays incurred
by the Department. Under these schemes, outstanding
amounts owing from fishers as at 30 June of the
financial year are recognised as ‘Amounts Receivable’.
In the 2010/11 year significant acquisitions
occurred in the Shark Bay prawn, Shark Bay scallop and
Abrolhos Island trawl fisheries. The borrowings relating
to these schemes and the recognition of associated
amounts receivable has impacted both assets and
liabilities at 30 June 2011.
Figure 14. Financial position – five-year trend
$ '000
120,000
100,000
80,000
60,000
40,000
20,000
0
45,431
Assets
Liabilities
NET ASSETS
63,887
2006/07 2007/08 2008/09 2009/10 2010/11
YEAR
59,915
61,764
61,185
33