Louis Braillelaan 80 Working Group II meeting Parkhotel … WG II... · 2017. 11. 13. · Working...

of 16 Pelagic Advisory Council-

Working Group II

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Pelagic AC

Louis Braillelaan 80 2719 EK Zoetermeer

The Netherlands Phone: +31 (0)63 375 6324

E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.pelagic-ac.org

Participants

1 Sean O’Donoghue Killybegs Fishermen’s Organisation Chairman 2 Anne-Mette Bæk Jespersen EU Fishmeal 3 Ashley Wilson The Pew Charitable Trusts 4 Aukje Coers Rederij Vrolijk 5 Bart Andriaenssens Swedish Agency for Marine and Water Management 6 Carl Jesper Hermansen Danish Fishermen PO 7 Carmen Abad Federación Provincial de Cofradías de Pescadores de Lugo 8 Carmen Fernandez ICES 9 Claus Reedtz Sparrevohn Danish Pelagic Producers Organisation 10 Delphine Roncin From Nord 11 Dominic Rihan BIM 12 Ed Farrell (by WebEx) University College Dublin 13 Esben Sverdrup-Jensen Danish Pelagic Producers Organisation 14 Frank Fleming Celtic Sea Herring Management Advisory Committee 15 Gerard van Balsfoort Pelagic Freezer-trawler Association 16 Goncalo Carvalho Sciaena 17 Hugo Mendes Instituto Português do Mar e da Atmosfera 18 Ian Gatt Scottish Pelagic Fishermen’s Association 19 Ignacio Fontaneda Lopez S.G. Caladero Nacional, Aguas Comunitarias y Acuicultura,

Secretaría General de Pesca 20 Jerome Jourdain UAPF 21 Jerome Nouis UAPF 22 Jesper Raakjær University of Aalborg 23 John Ward Irish Fish PO 24 José Beltran OPLUGO 25 Justyna Zajchowska The Pew Charitable Trusts 26 Karin Victoring Ministry for Enterprise and Innovation Sweden 27 Leon Bouts EFCA 28 Lisbet Nielsen Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries 29 Mads Larsson AIPCE 30 Martin Pastoors Pelagic Freezer-trawler Association 31 Matthew Clarke Permanent Representation of Ireland to the EU 32 Matthew Cox National Federation of Fishermen’s Organisation

Working Group II meeting 4 October 2017

12:30-18:00 hrs

Parkhotel

Molenstraat 53, 2513 BJ Den Haag

The Netherlands


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33 Miren Garmendia OPEGUI 34 Patrick Murphy Irish South & West PO 35 Piebe Hotsma Ministry of Economic Affairs Netherlands 36 Reine J. Johansson Swedish Pelagic Federation 37 Rob Banning Parlevliet en van der Plas 38 Rob Pronk Van der Zwan 39 Romain Soisson Compagnie des Pêches St-Malo 40 Steven Mackinson Scottish Fishermen’s Federation 41 Verena Ohms Pelagic AC 42 Wietze Kampen European Transport Worker’s Federation

1. Opening of the meeting by the chairman, Sean O’Donoghue

The chairman opened the meeting at 12:35 hrs and asked everyone to thoroughly stick to the timeline as foreseen in the agenda. Otherwise there was a risk of not being able to deal with all items.

2. Adoption of the agenda

The agenda was adopted without amendments.

3. Follow-up on action items

The first action item was in relation to the editorial rights to stakeholder information in the ICES advice. This is currently being discussed by ACOM and the chairman was not sure whether there is a definite answer in relation to the issue. The discussion arose particularly due to Celtic Sea herring where stakeholder information was deleted from the advice without prior notification of the stakeholders. In July the chairman had pointed out to Ghislain Chouinard that stakeholders would like to be informed prior to making such changes.

Carmen Fernandez confirmed that ACOM has talked about the issue, but she was not sure if it has been discussed in exactly the same form as it has been described now. ACOM considers that it has the editorial rights over the entire advice.

The chairman understood that ICES wants to have that right, but felt that if there are significant changes to the things contributed by stakeholders, then they should have the right to veto these changes and, if necessary, withdraw their contributions.

Carmen Fernandez promised to take the issue back to ACOM again.

The next action item was in relation to the choke mitigation tool which was discussed later that day.

Regarding EFCA’s gramme size project Leon Bouts explained that an expert has been hired recently to carry out the required data analysis, including data from the mackerel campaign earlier this year. He is analyzing weight distribution in the mackerel catch to see if there are any patterns. A first indication shows that the overall pattern is similar, but it was not quite clear what exactly that means. The data set is not exactly complete and the data has not been verified, meaning that no inspector had been present when it was collected. Nevertheless, EFCA will continue with the analysis and hopefully finish it in November. The mackerel autumn campaign will start again soon and it has again been included in the Joint Deployment Plan to gather data. EFCA has developed guidelines for inspectors from the Member States for collecting data at sea and upon landing. Leon Bouts hoped to have a full data set


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available soon which can be explored for patterns. After analyzing the data, EFCA will then be able to decide whether this work can help with providing compliance indicators. However, it will be up to the regional groups whether to use the tool or not.

The chairman thanked Leon Bouts for his presentation and decided to keep the issue on the agenda. He also pointed out that the Commission will organize a meeting on the control regulation in November where he will bring it up.

Leon Bout’s personal observation was that within the Member States dealing with the vessels it seemed that the level of cooperation with the project does vary.

Esben Sverdrup-Jensen asked for clarification whether the commitment is lacking from the fleets or the Member States.

Leon Bouts replied that this was difficult to say, but the impression is that Member States sometimes have difficulty getting complete data. While the Member States might have the authority to demand the data, it is all being done on a voluntary basis and this basis has to be strong.

The next action item was in relation to developing a management strategy for Irish Sea herring, but no progress has been made and Alan McCulla again did not attend the AC meeting.

In terms of lack of stakeholder involvement after the Irish Sea herring benchmark continued by correspondence, ICES recognized that the communication with stakeholders was less than optimal. It is therefore reviewing its benchmark procedures and assessing how to improve communication.

Regarding the herring mixing issue to be addressed in the Pelagic AC advice, the chairman said that Ed Farrell will provide more information about this in his presentation later that day.

The action items for herring in area 6a and 7b,c are all ongoing. The Member States seem amenable to including genetic sampling under the Data Collection Framework, but how to do this was not yet clear.

Martin Pastoors explained that he will be co-chairing an ICES group on splitting techniques for herring stocks that will include techniques such as otoliths reading, but also genetics.

Regarding the meeting with DG RESEARCH to seek funding for a broad genetics project, no progress has been made.

The next action item was in relation to Celtic Sea herring and concerned the question why information on spawning fish in different areas was not taken into account in the assessment. ICES explained that the assessment of 2017 was conducted in the same manner as it has been conducted over recent years. The stock area includes herring from divisions 7a South of 52°30’N, 7g-h and 7j-k. The assessment is for the entire stock and does not make separate assessments of spawning fish from different areas within the stock. The chairman said that he would address the issue again during the presentation of the ICES advice.

The action items in regards to western horse mackerel are all ongoing. There has not been an opportunity yet to hold a focus group meeting, but the chairman hoped to have one in October or November.

The management strategy for southern horse mackerel has been drafted and uploaded to the website. It was going to be discussed later during the day and the chairman hoped that the meeting would reach a consensus position for adopting the strategy.

Regarding boarfish the chairman explained that the management strategy developed by the Pelagic AC and which has been evaluated by ICES as precautionary contained two closures. However, there was an issue with implementing the closures that originated in the NWW regional group. It has then


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been decided to amend the strategy so that the closures coincide with the Irish closures. This is a very small issue, but the regional group has still not addressed it. The chairman asked Matthew Clarke to take it back to the Irish administration.

The final action item concerned the boarfish assessment. Currently the stock is considered a category 3 stock and the chairman was anxious to get an analytical assessment again. However, he expected this to take a while.

4. Fishing opportunities 2018: presentation of ICES advice by Carmen Fernandez (information)

The chairman invited Carmen Fernandez to present the ICES advice for the relevant Working Group II stocks.

• Northeast Atlantic mackerel

Carmen Fernandez explained that the ICES advice for 2018 was based on MSY and resulted in a catch advice of no more than 550 948 tons. While SSB is above MSY Btrigger, F is between Fmsy and Fpa. There have been several large year classes since 2002. The stock has been benchmarked in 2017 and there have been some modifications to the IESSNS indices and how the assessment deals with it. Ages 3 to 11 of the IESSNS have now been included in the assessment as well as additional tagging data. The tagging data have also been revised. Furthermore, reference points have been updated and the new values are as follows:

• Blim = 1.94 million tons

• Bpa and MSY Btrigger = 2.57 million tons

• Flim = 0.48

• Fpa = 0.35

• Fmsy = 0.21

Overall there are no major changes in stock perception, but the estimates of SSB are lower now, while estimates of F have increased. This is also the reason why the ICES advice for 2018 is lower than it has been for 2017.

The catch in 2016 was 1.094 million tons and the discard ratio is below 1%. Approximately 78% of the landings are from pelagic trawl, 20% from purse-seine fisheries and about 2% are from other fleets. There has been a geographical expansion of the Northern summer fishery in recent years and since 2010 almost half of the catch has been taken in quarter 3.

There had also been a special request to evaluate a harvest control rule with a range of Btrigger between 2 and 5 million tons and appropriate F targets. All rules were tested with an inter-annual TAC constraint of 20% down and 25% up if SSB in the TAC year was above Btrigger. The rules were tested with fixed weights-at-age and density-dependent weights-at-age.

Carmen Fernandez showed the results of the evaluation for all the different rules tested. The results were color-coded and everything that was not red, was precautionary. For any given combination of Ftarget and Btrigger the effect of incorporating the TAC constraint is minor. The difference in median long-term yield with or without constraint never exceeds 5% and for most combinations, both the probability of SSB falling below Blim and the inter-annual yield variability are somewhat lower with TAC constraint than without it.

With the TAC constraint, the catch could get trapped at a low level if the stock is forecast to be below Btrigger in one year. When the stock is forecast to drop below Btrigger, the catch could potentially experience a big decrease because the TAC constraint would no longer apply. Once the stock recovered


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above Btrigger, the 25% constraint on TAC increase could lead to a loss in potential catch because of the constraint on the TAC increase being applied to a low starting point. Discontinuities in advice rules are in general not desirable and it could be useful to consider ways of achieving a smoother transition around Btrigger.

For any given Ftarget and Btrigger combination, a wide range of yield and inter-annual yield variability values may occur in the future. Future values could be quite different from the medians reported in the tables. The range of possible future values widens as the Ftarget increases. For inter-annual yield variability, the range widens considerably with increases in either the Ftarget or the Btrigger; in such cases inter-annual yield variability values that are much higher than the medians reported in the tables cannot be ruled out.

One of the things that is not written in the advice is that the simulation did not incorporate the TAC constraint in the first year. If this was to be implemented in the first year, it would require additional thinking.

The chairman was concerned about the smoothing effect. He agreed that there should be a smoothing effect, but he did not see how it would work in practice. The other issue he was surprised about was that in the simulations the TAC constraint was not applied in the first year and he wanted to know why not.

Considering the high catch observed in 2016 and expected in 2017 Carmen Fernandez did not consider it a good idea to use the TAC constraint in year 1 relative to those catches. Catches of that magnitude have not been tested by ICES in the simulations. Regarding the smoothing effect she said that the deciding factor on whether or not to apply the TAC constraint is whether the stock is below Btrigger.

Gerard van Balsfoort said that the advice for this stock usually jumps all over the place. He was surprised by the strong downwards adjustment and looking at the fishery he did not really believe it. He pointed out that from one year to the next different weights are used for different data sets. He understood that this was done for the egg survey, given it took place only every three years. However, last year the weight of the IESSNS survey increased and this year it increased again. He wanted to know why. His second question concerned the large difference between Fpa and Fmsy. For most other stocks these values are either the same or at least they are closer together. He wanted to know why this was different for mackerel. His last question was about the TAC constraint and why it has not been included in the catch options table even though there already is a management strategy in place agreed by the 3 major Coastal States that does include a TAC constraint.

Carmen Fernandez replied that the stock assessors assign the weights to the different data sources according to the fit between the model and data. So, the model itself decides what weight it gives to the different pieces of data. The model now includes more ages of the IESSNS survey, but to account for year effects in the survey a correlation between ages has been included in the model since the 2017 benchmark. This is turn is down-weighting the survey. Carmen Fernandez was not sure why there is such a large difference between Fmsy and Fpa. She said that reference points were addressed during the management strategy evaluation that took place after the benchmark and ICES guidelines were followed in determining them. The stock is healthy with good recruitment. Therefore, she would not expect a lower Fpa value. Regarding the third issue raised by Gerard van Balsfoort she explained that ICES did not consider any management strategy in the catch options table, because ICES was not aware that it should have considered it given that the clients did not ask ICES to include it.


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• Western horse mackerel

For western horse mackerel ICES advised according to the MSY approach that catches should be no more than 117 070 tons in 2018. This stock is dependent on occasional high recruitment events. Recruitment has been low since 2002, but was somewhat higher in that past three years. SSB is currently at its lowest level observed. Even though fishing mortality increased after 2007, it is presently below Fmsy. The stock has been benchmarked at the beginning of this year and a new assessment model, called stock synthesis, is now being used. This model uses age and length data, as well as the triennial egg survey, a recruitment index from the IBTS survey and an acoustic survey from Division 8c as tuning data. The benchmark also agreed on new reference points. Overall, the perception of stock trends is similar to the previous assessment, but SSB is now perceived to be higher while F is estimated to be lower in recent years. Nevertheless, the assessment is still very uncertain. The higher absolute estimate of SSB does, however, lead to an increase in the catch advice for 2018.

The chairman remarked that the rescaling was enormous which in his view calls into question the whole assessment.

Carmen Fernandez said that the real importance lies in the assessment continuing to perform well in the future. The new model is sufficiently different to what was used before and therefore she is not surprised about the large change.

Martin Pastoors said that he participated in the expert group meeting where it was discussed whether this is a category 1 or category 2 stock because of the rescaling. He wanted to know what the rationale is for classifying something as a category 1 or 2 stock. He has seen a lot of rescaling for this stock, sometimes as large as 15% within one year.

Carmen Fernandez confirmed that this issue has also been discussed at the ADG and that it was a borderline decision. One consideration in the ADG was that there would not be much practical difference between category 1 and category 2 as long as the stock is above Btrigger. If the stock falls below Btrigger it can make a difference, because for category 2 stocks reference points are being recalculated every year. In the end the ADG decided to keep this stock classified as category 1.

Goncalo Carvalho wanted to hear more about the pattern of SSB.

Carmen Fernandez explained that when there is a decreasing trend, people get very alarmed and start to worry. However, horse mackerel has always been considered to be a special case. So, it could be argued that the big increase in SSB in the mid and late eighties may be an anomaly due to the exceptionally high 1982 year class coming through. The question is then whether a very high fishing mortality has caused the strong decline in SSB or whether the current situation is actually normal for this stock. ICES believes that the stock is fine at this stage, because fishing mortality is low and if the stock decreases, so will the catch advice.

• Southern horse mackerel

For southern horse mackerel ICES advised catches of no more than 55 555 tons which corresponds to MSY. F has been below Fmsy and SSB has been above MSY Btrigger for the entire time series. Recruitment in 2011 to 2015 has been above average. The benchmark in early 2017 did not lead to any significant changes in stock perception nor reference points. Carmen Fernandez clarified that the ICES advice is for Trachurus trachurus only, while the TAC is set for all Trachurus species. The percentage of other Trachurus species in the horse mackerel catch varies by year and has been estimated to be below 10% in 2016. ICES also considers that management of several species under a combined TAC prevents effective control of the single species exploitation rates and could lead to overexploitation of any of the species.


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The chairman asked for comments from the meeting participants and said that the stock will be dealt with in more detail when discussing the draft management strategy.

For clarification Hugo Mended pointed out that the management strategy will only apply to Trachurus trachurus.

• Boarfish

Boarfish is a category 3 stock and as such ICES follows the precautionary approach and gives biannual advice. The catch advice for 2018 and 2019 is no more than 21 830 tons. Stock status relative to potential reference points is unknown, but stock biomass is estimated to be at a lower level since 2014. In 2016 the catch was 19 315 tons including 6.6% discarding from demersal gears. All landings came from the pelagic fishery. The assessment uses indices from six bottom trawl surveys and one acoustic survey. The overall biomass index is influenced by the acoustic survey which was redesigned in 2017 to improve stock coverage. There is a limited understanding of stock dynamics. Since the precautionary buffer has been applied last year, it is not being reapplied this year.

Gerard van Balsfoort noticed that 1500 tons of boarfish have been discarded and he wanted to know where these discards came from.

The chairman replied that these discards are from Spanish demersal trawlers. He pointed out that there was a problem with the acoustic survey in 2016 and given that there will be another data point next year he wanted to know whether the advice will be looked at again.

Carmen Fernandez said that the advice will not be re-opened next year unless there is reason to believe that there are major changes.

5. Northeast Atlantic mackerel

• Adoption of PELAC advice (decision)

The chairman summarized that the ICES advice was based on MSY which resulted in a catch advice of 550 948 tons. However, last year the Pelagic AC recommended developing a long-term management strategy to be agreed on by the three main Coastal States and to follow that strategy if ICES considers it to be precautionary. This now seemed to be the case and he therefore suggested to recommend following the management strategy including the TAC constraint. He was not sure about the concrete TAC figure resulting from that. He also said that there are some technical issues that should be addressed, i.e. the different signals between the egg survey and the IESSNS survey, RFID tagging and density-dependent growth.

Gerard van Balsfoort said that he had already questioned why one of the obvious catch options has not been included in the catch options table, namely the Coastal States agreement with the TAC constraint. He recommended applying the new management strategy including the TAC constraint to set the TAC for 2018.

The chairman thought that the Coastal States probably assumed that this option would have been included in the catch options table. However, it should be no problem for ICES to still provide the figure.

Gerard van Balsfoort added that it would also be logical to apply the TAC constraint to the TAC, not the catches, especially since it was known that other parties have overshot their TACs.

Esben Sverdrup-Jensen raised a principle issue about mackerel. He pointed out that this is the most valuable stock in the Northeast Atlantic and both the fishing industry, including the catching and the


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processing sector, as well as the scientific community have a lot of questions about this stock. There is no full understanding of how the stock develops and what the total size is. Overall, fishermen had little faith in the stock assessment, especially considering that just a few years ago the stock was treated as a data-limited stock. Therefore, people are putting a lot of effort into increasing the knowledge base for this stock. Taking major leaps in the recommendations could be quite risky and people should follow a cautious approach. The TAC constraint could be one way, but he also wanted to communicate that more effort has to be put into measuring the stock.

Goncalo Carvalho said that normally the NGOs would want to support the ICES advice, but already last year they made an exception. However, finding a management strategy precautionary is not enough anymore under the new CFP. It also has to meet Fmsy. He expected that ICES would be requested to take that into account when evaluating a management strategy, but until now this has not been the case. Therefore, he thought that AC should take this onboard. He saw several option that were both precautionary and in line with Fmsy.

The chairman considered this a fair comment. He understood that last year’s strategy had also been evaluated by ICES which concluded that the strategy was suitable.

Carmen Fernandez did not think that ICES has formally evaluated the previous plan, but she thought that it was included in the options table of this year’s evaluation. The reason is that ICES waited for the benchmark to take place first.

The chairman concluded that the strategy is precautionary and that he was willing to build a condition around it.

Justyna Zajchowska preferred to follow the ICES MSY approach given the downward trend of the stock and the poor state of the North Sea component.

The chairman responded that the stock is still very strong and that the North Sea component has not existed for the past 40 years. As such it has no impact on the assessment. He therefore suggested to accept the formula mentioned by Goncalo Carvalho and to go with the management strategy as long as it is precautionary and meets the conditions of article 2.2 of the CFP.

Goncalo Carvalho agreed that this would be a good way forward and a possibility to reach common ground.

The chairman concluded that he will provide a draft before tomorrow’s Executive Committee meeting including also the technical issues and density-dependency.

Martin Pastoors clarified that density-dependent growth is only relevant for long-term simulations, not for the short term. It was hence decided to exclude this point.

Carmen Fernandez was not entirely sure if the values from the management strategy that the chairman wanted to use are precautionary. She promised to look it up.1

The chairman was confident that they are precautionary, but agreed to double-checking this.

6. Western horse mackerel

• Update on focus group (information)

The chairman provided a very brief update about the focus group on western horse mackerel. He said that the last meeting took place in July and the minutes can be downloaded from the website. Since

1 This was subsequently resolved at the meeting, i.e. that the plan referred to was the one to be revised using the new benchmark reference points at the Coastal States mackerel meeting scheduled for London the following week.


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then there has been no further progress, but he hoped to have another focus group meeting in October or November, especially taking into account the information from this year’s benchmark.


The chairman suggested to follow the ICES advice, to develop a new management strategy and to continue the genetics project. The meeting agreed.

7. Southern horse mackerel

• Presentation of draft management strategy by Hugo Mendes (information)

The chairman was pleased to announce that a draft management strategy has finally been developed for the stock. He congratulated all the people that have been involved in the process. He invited Hugo Mendes to present the final draft strategy.

Hugo Mendes said that he would only provide a brief overview since a very detailed presentation has already been given in July. However, he was happy to answer any technical questions during the coffee break or after the meeting. The strategy was the result of an initiative by the Pelagic AC in collaboration with scientists from IPMA, IEO and JRC as well as stakeholders from Spain and Portugal and members of the SWW AC. The strategy has been developed over a period of almost three years. Close collaboration with stakeholders was ensured through focus group meetings, stakeholder questionnaires and consultations during AC meetings.

In July 2016 biological reference points were accepted by ICES and during the benchmark in early 2017 stock ID, biological and productivity parameters as well as the assessment method were reviewed. The reviewed assessment was subsequently used for the full MSE approach. Different management scenarios were explored including various TAC constraints and aiming to increase fishing mortality to Fmsy by 2025. All of the scenarios selected were consistent with the precautionary approach and the MSY approach. The final catch option chosen by stakeholders had the form: TACy+1 = TACy and included a +/- 15% TAC constraint. The rationale for choosing this catch option was the increased stability for the fishery. Running a risk analysis also showed that the selected rule was the only one that prevented the stock to fall below Blim under catastrophic conditions. Currently IPMA, IEO and JRC are producing a scientific technical report with the evaluation on the options for the long-term management strategy for southern horse mackerel

The chairman thanked Hugo Mendes for his presentation and decided to have a coffee break before adopting the Pelagic AC’s recommendations.


The chairman suggested following the ICES advice for 2018 and to agree on the management strategy, so that it can be submitted to the Commission with the request to ask ICES for an evaluation of the strategy.

He and Goncalo Carvalho also explained that there had been a small change to the strategy compared to the version that is available on the website. Goncalo Carvalho read aloud the new paragraph.

The meeting endorsed the recommendation for 2018 and the slightly amended long-term management strategy


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8. Boarfish

• Update on proposed closures (information)

Matthew Clarke announced that he checked with the Irish administration why boarfish was not discussed at the last NWW regional group meeting and it seemed that the closures had not been mentioned in the last email sent to Belgium which then was chairing the NWW group. However, if the Pelagic AC sends a request to Spain, which is the new chair of the NWW group, then the closures should be discussed by the NWW group.

The chairman concluded to send one final letter to the chair of the NWW group requesting the group to recommend the boarfish closures.


The chairman suggested to follow the ICES advice and to recommend a TAC of 21 830 tons in 2018 as well as to continue the work on the analytical assessment. The meeting agreed.

9. Herring in 6a and 7b,c

• Update on genetics study (Edward Farrell, information)

Edward Farrell thanked the chairman for the opportunity to share the preliminary results on the herring genetics work he has done over the past couple of years. The sampling, DNA extraction, genetic marker development, screening with the markers and the sequencing has all been completed. Preliminary results for the sequence analysis were also available as well as a preliminary set of high-graded markers. Samples have been collected over a number of years from the North Sea, Celtic Sea, Irish Sea, 6a South and 6a North as well as from the Baltic Sea which served as a control. There was also one non-spawning sample from area 6a North, because Edward Farrell wanted to see where that fits into the picture.

So far 38 out of 60 microsatellites have been scored. Overall, Edward Farrell found a low level of genetic difference within South and North spawners and a significantly higher difference between them. The non-spawning samples from the West of Hebrides is a mix with more fish from 6a South. In general, southern samples, i.e. from 6a South and the Celtic Sea cluster together as do northern samples from the Irish Sea, North Sea, 6a North and West of Hebrides.

The analysis of 16 out of 50 SNPs so far gives a similar picture. There was no significant difference between 6a North and the North Sea, but there was a difference between 6a South, the Celtic Sea and the Irish Sea.

Further analysis was required to identify markers that are very informative and those that are less informative and might be dropped. It was also necessary to test and confirm temporal stability. The final marker panel will be based on specific stock ID requirements.

In summary, both microsatellites and SNPs are showing a similar structure and there is a clear difference between spawners from 6a North and 6a South. The structure seems temporally stable, but there is some inter-annual variability within areas. It is also possible to distinguish Celtic Sea and Irish Sea samples, although this could be improved. There is no evidence for a strong structure between samples from 6a North and the North Sea. Using genetic analysis, it seems possible to split mixed samples as indicated by the sample from the West of Hebrides.


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The next steps will be to finalize a high-graded panel of markers and to collect a more comprehensive 6a South data set. If the application for the EASME tender is successful, Edward Farrell will also screen the MSHAS samples, develop a mixed stock analysis model and a rapid onboard collection method.

The chairman thanked Edward Farrell for the presentation and considered the results to be very encouraging. He also said that the Commission informed him that the evaluation of the EASME project has been completed, but that there was some outstanding questions. He hoped that the tender will be awarded within the next two weeks.

• Update on industry surveys (Steven Mackinson, information)

Steven Mackinson presented an update on the industry surveys to improve the knowledge base for the spawning components of herring in 6a North and 6a South-7b,c, and submit it to ICES to assist in assessing the herring stocks and contribute to establishing a rebuilding plan. The objectives of the survey are to:

• Collect acoustic data and information on the size and age of herring to allow estimation of the abundance of spawning components of herring in 6a North

• Collect morphometric and genetic data to distinguish whether the 6aN stocks are different from the stocks in 6aS, 7b,c.

A total of 33 hauls and 1534 samples have been taken, for both genetic and morphometric analysis. Overall the data are very good this year. Each acoustic survey was completed twice and there are enough biological samples. Nearly every commercial haul has been sampled. There were a few things that could be done better in the future, e.g. be clearer on objectives and choose the best vessels suited for the task. Creel fishermen should also be notified in advance.

The survey in 6a South and 7b,c is foreseen to take place around the 10th of November for about 10 days with 1 industry vessel involved.

The chairman thanked Steven Mackinson for the update and presumed that at the February meeting both surveys will have to be analyzed.

Gerard van Balsfoort said that quota is given to the vessels participating in the surveys. However, some vessels catch herring in the area in a non-targeted fishery and he was not sure what to do with these bycatches. They cannot be placed anywhere, because the TAC is being used for the survey and he was not sure how to solve this issue.

The chairman said that Ireland had retained a small amount of its herring quota in 6a north to cover any bycatches. He suggested addressing the issue when dealing with the choke mitigation tool.


In terms of advice for 2018 the chairman suggested having a scientific monitoring TAC again and to follow-up on the evaluation of the rebuilding plan. He also wanted to continue the genetics project and the industry surveys and to seek a benchmark once the genetic information is available. He wanted to have a benchmark as soon as possible and hopefully in early 2019.

Ian Gatt supported the suggestions. He pointed out that a lot of information on the stocks is being collected. This is a positive development that must be continued. Regarding the benchmark he preferred to refer to scientific data in general, not just genetic data. He also thought that early 2019 might be quite optimistic.


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The chairman agreed to referring to scientific data in general. However, he was also anxious to have a benchmark as soon as possible, even though he was aware that some of the scientists wanted to push it back for a couple of years.

Ian Gatt was concerned that there was a risk of having the benchmark too early and subsequently having to wait another couple of years for another chance, if it fails.

However, the chairman replied that in his experience some of the herring stocks have a benchmark every two years.

Steven Mackinson thought that it would be better to wait one year, if it turns out that there is not enough information available yet. He also pointed out that the rebuilding plan will already be evaluated in November.

The chairman agreed to rephrasing the recommendation in regards to the benchmark.

Goncalo Carvalho said that the advice on the monitoring TAC has not been set for several years, but he understood that at least one more year was needed.

Steven Mackinson replied that generally ICES will require at least three years for any time series. So far, two years were available, so at least one more year was needed.

10. Celtic Sea herring


The chairman said that there is a continuous problem with Celtic Sea herring in regards to the MSY approach versus the management strategy. The management strategy is more precautionary than the MSY approach and the Pelagic AC has put a lot of effort into developing it. He warned people to be cautious about dismissing it as soon as the strategy gives a higher number than MSY. In all the previous years it gave a lower number and people have always followed it.

Carmen Fernandez said that ICES had gotten questions from the Pelagic AC last week concerning Irish Sea herring. They were in relation to statements in the advice sheet for Irish Sea herring. She explained that there had been a benchmark and that the advice stated that management of the stock should be considered as part of a meta population and needs to be further evaluated. The Pelagic AC wanted to know what evaluation ICES was referring to, when it will take place and whether it requires an MSE evaluation. She said that essentially experts are working on addressing the problem and are in the process of developing a joint project between Northern Irish scientists and the Marine Institute. There was also a commitment to revisit the stock through a benchmark process. She assumed that the next benchmark will take place in approximately three years.

The chairman clarified that there will be a Celtic Sea herring benchmark next year, but due to the mixing issue, a dimension of Irish Sea herring will come into this too.

Carmen Fernandez was not sure whether the benchmark will deal with the meta population structure. She explained that the issue is similar to what happened in 3a where ICES was able to deal with it by separating the two main components. The current case, however, is more complicated since it concerns winter and autumn spawners and their behavior is not so well known. Therefore, the approach from 3a will likely not work so well in this case. She also added that doing an MSE is not necessarily the best answer, at least not in the short-term and would require more funding and data. Instead, experts mentioned the genetics work done by Edward Farrell which they believe will provide more insight.


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The second question from the Pelagic AC to ICES was about the statement that due to the presence of herring from other stocks, the assessment may overestimate the Irish Sea stock. People wanted to know how ICES considered mixing when issuing the advice. Carmen Fernandez explained that the current assessment of the Irish Sea was an area-based assessment and provided advice for an area, rather than a stock.

The last question was in relation to the assessment of Irish Sea herring incorporating the acoustic survey as an absolute index. People wanted to know whether other acoustic surveys for other herring stocks can also be treated as absolute indices. Carmen Fernandez explained that this will need to be evaluated on a case by case basis.

The chairman thanked Carmen Fernandez for these clarifications and added that there will be a WKIRISH workshop at the end of October which was open for interested stakeholders. In terms of the advice for Celtic Sea herring in 2018 he suggested following the management strategy like in previous years.

Goncalo Carvalho said that there is a difference between something being precautionary and something being in line with MSY. He was convinced that the management strategy was generally more precautionary. However, it was not clear to him if following the management strategy will recover the stock quickly enough. He said that the stock seemed to be close to Blim and if the management strategy will be followed in 2018, this might close the fishery in 2019.

Frank Fleming thanked the Pelagic AC for the opportunity to speak at the meeting. He said that the background document on the management strategy showed that the plan is precautionary. The behavior of the fish has changed and therefore the survey could not be used in the assessment. The Celtic Sea Herring Management Advisory Committee is working closely together with the Marine Institute which is going over the data again seeing that fish that was previously in the water column is now on the bottom. He said that the Committee has worked very well in the past and whenever hard decisions had to be made, this committee has made them.

The chairman summarized that the management strategy is precautionary according to ICES and that people invested considerable effort and time in this strategy. When the ICES MSY advice gave a higher TAC number in previous years, the industry never even considered going for MSY, because everyone has been very committed to the strategy. He suggested discussing the issue offline with the conflicting parties and he was sure that agreement could be reached.

Goncalo Carvalho agreed to an offline discussion and emphasized that he, too, wanted to reach agreement.

11. Irish Sea herring


The chairman summarized that the benchmark significantly changed the perception of Irish Sea herring which resulted in an upward revision of SSB and hence a much higher TAC advice compared to last year. He recommended following the ICES MSY advice, following-up on the mixing issue with Celtic Sea herring, providing input to the next benchmark and commencing work on a management strategy for this stock.

The meeting supported the recommendations.


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12. Outcomes of the focus group meeting on the choke mitigation tool (information)

The chairman invited Dominic Rihan to present the work he has done for the Pelagic AC on the choke mitigation tool and the results from the recent focus group meeting.

Dominic Rihan presented the choke mitigation tool which he helped develop for the NWW AC. The Pelagic AC tried to use this tool to look at some of the issues in pelagic fisheries. He had looked at 18 different stocks in the relevant sea basin, focusing on those demersal stocks that are mostly caught in pelagic fisheries.

For example, in the Celtic Sea haddock and whiting are bycatches in pelagic fisheries and could choke those fisheries. There is also a chance that catches in pelagic fisheries could choke demersal fisheries and potentially close them. Whiting, cod and saithe in area 6a are big choke species and especially cod is a problem, because it has a zero TAC. Even though the reported catch in 6a is very low, there is a risk for both demersal and pelagic fisheries. In the Bay of Biscay whiting is a problem, particularly for France which has high discards. This problem is exacerbated because selectivity cannot be improved. This makes it likely that the fisheries will be closed, including pelagic. For hake, cod and saithe on the other hand, there are potential selectivity measures that could be taken and some countries are already running trials.

Another thing to note is that some countries have zero quota which can create a huge problem, because these countries have to rely entirely on swaps.

Dominic Rihan remembered that at the beginning of the landing obligation there had been a discussion for an onshore de minimis and he thought that the Pelagic AC should consider resurrecting the idea given that soon all demersal stocks will come under the landing obligation.

Looking at pelagic catches in demersal fisheries there are some specific risks, such as herring in 6a North and South due to zero quota. There are some reported catches of herring in the area by the demersal fleet, meaning they could choke the pelagic fisheries. Boarfish is another problem that will only get worse once the demersal fleet will have to land boarfish too. The other high-risk choke stock is horse mackerel in the North Sea which has a high discard rate. There is already a de minims for the French semi-artisanal fishery, but that solves only part of the problem. This is also an issue for Belgium which has zero quota for horse mackerel. Celtic Sea herring, western horse mackerel, mackerel and blue whiting are all potential problems, but could be solved with a de minimis given that discards are usually low for these stocks.

Dominic Rihan concluded his presentation by pointing out that applying the choke mitigation tool is a very useful exercise. Even though many of the issues cannot be easily solved, the tool will hopefully focus people’s minds on how to deal with them.

The chairman thanked Dominic Rihan for the work he has done and emphasized that the focus group meeting on the tool had been very useful. Rather than having a Q and A round now, he invited people to look at the excel sheets on the website and see if there is anything missing. Especially industry representatives should make sure that the data are complete. He said that during the Executive Committee meeting he will try to get a mandate for Dominic Rihan to present his results at the seminar on the landing obligation in November.

Gerard van Balsfoort said that the end of year swaps could be a solution for very small bycatches and he wanted to know whether Dominic Rihan has included those in his analysis.

Dominic Rihan said that some of these end of year swaps could provide a solution and are worth mentioning. However, he did not specifically address them. He also said that most demersal catches in pelagic fisheries are not necessarily big problems, but some of them are.


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Esben Sverdrup-Jensen wanted to know who identifies the mitigation measures and whether there is anything that cannot be solved by inter-species flexibility.

Dominic Rihan said that for the NWW AC all the mitigation measures had been filled in and he was not sure that the same has to be done for the Pelagic AC in such detail. For the demersal stocks it would just be repeating what the NWW AC did. Inter-species flexibility can solve some problems, but not all, because not all stocks are in safe biological limits. Furthermore, inter-species flexibility seemed to be more of a theoretical tool since almost nobody has used it in practice.

The chairman added that e.g. cod in area 6 and whiting in almost all areas are outside safe biological limits and hence inter-species flexibility cannot be used for these stocks. This is exactly what the tool identifies, i.e. stocks for which there is no solution. In such cases people either have to be inventive or close the fisheries.

13. AOB

There was no other business.

14. End of meeting

The chairman closed the meeting at 18:15 hrs and thanked the participants for their contributions.

Action items

General

• Discuss with ACOM and at MIACO meeting that stakeholders should have the right to withdraw their information if it is going to be changed in the advice sheets (Carmen Fernandez, chairman)

• Follow-up on gramme size project at the next PELAC meeting (chairman, EFCA)

• Mention the gramme size project at the workshop on the evaluation of the control regulation in November (chairman)

• Seek endorsement from the Executive Committee to ask Dominic Rihan to present the results of the choke mitigation tool for stocks relevant to the Pelagic AC (chairman)

Irish Sea herring

• Continue development of management strategy (Ian Gatt, Steven Mackinson, Alan McCulla)

• Participate in WKIRISH (chairman, interested Working Group members)

• Follow-up on mixing issue with Celtic Sea herring (chairman, ICES)

Herring in 6a and 7b,c

• Develop a genetic sampling protocol (6.a herring focus group)

• Arrange a genetics workshop with ICES once the sampling protocol is available (6.a herring focus group, Ken Whelan)


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• Ask Member States and Commission to include genetic sampling in Data Collection Framework once a protocol has been developed (Pelagic AC)

• Include genetic sampling at WKSPLIT (Martin Pastoors)

• Arrange meeting with DG RESEARCH to seek funding for broad pelagic genetics project (Ken Whelan)

• Peer-review herring genetics project (Ken Whelan, AST)

• Continue genetic, acoustic and morphometric research (NPWG)

• Provide update on genetic analysis at February meeting (Edward Farrell)

• Provide update in acoustic surveys at February meeting (Steven Mackinson, Martin Pastoors)

• Address issue of bycatch in other fisheries through choke mitigation tool (focus group on choke mitigation tool)

Celtic Sea herring

• Participate in WKIRISH (interested Working Group II members)

Western horse mackerel

• Arrange the next focus group meeting in October or November 2017 (chairman, secretariat)

• Continue genetics project (NPWG, PFA)

• Continue PFA research project (PFA)

• Continue to develop management strategy (focus group)

Southern horse mackerel

• Seek endorsement from the Executive Committee for the draft management strategy (chairman)

Northeast Atlantic mackerel

• Follow-up on technical issues in relation to the IESSNS versus the egg survey and the RFID tagging data (Working Group II, ICES)

Boarfish

• Submit letter to the chair of the NWW regional group asking for implementation of the boarfish closures (chairman, secretariat)

• Continue work on analytical assessment

Louis Braillelaan 80 Working Group II meeting Parkhotel … WG II... · 2017. 11. 13. · Working...

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