CCAMLR

Improvement of krill fishing notification accuracy through notification fees
Delegation of the United States
The Commission adopted notification procedures for krill fishing in 2005. These procedures
were intended to improve the Scientific Committee’s ability to provide advice to the
Commission on krill fishing for the coming season. However, grossly inaccurate estimations
of krill catch provided in Members’ notifications have hampered the Scientific Committee’s
ability to properly estimate the seasonal krill catch and to provide robust scientific advice.
Instead, the Scientific Committee’s scarce and valuable time is spent on analyses that are of
limited use due to their inherent inaccuracies. The Scientific Committee has expressed
concern, and the Commission has discussed several times, the lack of accuracy of the
notifications.
The Commission has also noted that the Secretariat incurs an administrative cost when it
processes krill fishing notifications, including notifications from vessels that end up not
fishing. These administrative steps and costs are no different from the more familiar
expenses incurred in processing notifications for Dissostichus spp. fisheries. The
Dissostichus spp. notification processing fees are necessary to maintain a level budget for the
Commission without rising operational and administrative costs, an issue of much concern to
all Commission Members. Not surprisingly, the CCAMLR Performance Review Panel also
considered the need for cost-recovery for CCAMLR’s administrative costs beyond the
Dissostichus spp. fishery: “7.1.1.2 2. ... develop a cost-recovery policy which would be
applied to all commercial fishing operations...”
At CCAMLR’s 2009 Annual Meeting, the SCIC considered a proposal to address cost
recovery for processing krill fishing notifications. The Members considered a variety of
options including elements that would restrict fishing for those vessels that notified but did
not ultimately fish, changes to the Member contribution formula, and a fee system associated
with notifications. In the course of discussions, it was noted that the Secretariat recoups its
costs for processing Dissostichus spp. fishery notifications and that the cost would be
approximately the same to process each krill fishing notification. While the SCIC was unable
to reach agreement on how best to recover the Secretariat’s costs for processing krill fishing
notifications, the discussions generally revealed that whatever method is applied, the
CCAMLR Secretariat’s funds were becoming increasingly scarce and that they would benefit
from some sort of compensatory regime. The discussion did not lead to an agreement on how
to address the cost recovery idea, and the issue was left open for discussion in 2010.

SUMMARY OF NOTIFICATIONS FOR KRILL FISHERIES IN 2010/11
Secretariat
In accordance with Conservation Measure 21-03, seven Members notified their intentions to
participate in krill fisheries in Subareas 48.1, 48.2, 48.3 and 48.4 and Divisions 58.4.1 and
58.4.2 in 2009/10 (Table 1) ; there was no notification submitted for exploratory fisheries for
krill in 2010/11 (Conservation Measure 21-02). Fifteen fishing vessels have been included in
the notifications and the expected catch of krill is approximately 410 000 tonnes (Tables 2
and 3, and Figure 1). The notifications are in Appendix 1.
2. The notifications were submitted to the 2010 meeting of WG-EMM (WG-EMM-
10/6), and the Working Group’s advice on this matter is reported in SC-CAMLR-XXIX/3
(paragraphs 2.18 to 2. 21).
3. Following a request from WG-EMM last year (SC-CAMLR-XXVIII, Annex 4,
Paragraph 3.32), the essential information contained in krill fishery notifications submitted in
official languages other than English was translated into English in order to facilitate
evaluation by the working Group (see Appendix 1, notifications from Chile and Russia).

SUMMARY OF NOTIFICATIONS FOR
NEW AND EXPLORATORY FISHERIES IN 2010/11
Secretariat
1. Ten Members submitted 67 notifications for exploratory fisheries in 2010/11. These
notifications were for exploratory longline fisheries for Dissostichus spp. in Subareas 48.6,
88.1, 88.2 and Divisions 58.4.1, 58.4.2, 58.4.3a and 58.4.3b (Table 1). There was no
notification submitted for new fisheries in 2010/11 (Conservation Measure 21-01). The
notifications were posted on the CCAMLR website and have been subsequently distributed as
Commission working papers (CCAMLR-XXIX/22 to XXIX/31). The notification summary
pages are appended to this report.
2. Members and the number of vessels notified for each exploratory fishery for
Dissostichus spp. in 2010/11, and the corresponding number of participating Members,
number of vessels and catch limits agreed in 2009/10, are given in Table 2.
3. The number of notifications received for 2010/11 (67) is less than previous seasons
(e.g. 72 notifications for 2009/10; 72 for 2008/09; 86 for 2007/08; 73 for 2006/07; 73 for
2005/06; 75 for 2004/05).
4. Notifying Members were also required to provide preliminary assessments of known
and anticipated impacts of notified exploratory bottom fishing activities on vulnerable marine
ecosystems. These assessments are collated in CCAMLR-XXIX/21.
1

DEVELOPMENT OF A COMPLIANCE EVALUATION PROCEDURE (DOCEP) INTERSESSIONAL WORK 2010
BACKGROUND
In accordance with CCAMLR-XXVIII, paragraph 8.39, the DOCEP group continued its work intersessionally via email on the development of a compliance evaluation procedure during 2010. At CCAMLR-XXVIII, Members were informed that this work would include the circulation of a questionnaire to provide an indication of Members’ views on the impacts of non-compliance with a number of conservation measures (CCAMLR-XXVIII, paragraph 8.39).
DOCEP INTERSESSIONAL WORK 2010

TERMS OF REFERENCE AND ORGANISATION OF WORK
OF THE STANDING COMMITTEE ON IMPLEMENTATION
AND COMPLIANCE (SCIC)
The Standing Committee on Implementation and Compliance (SCIC) was established
by the Commission with the following terms of reference.
1. The Committee shall be tasked with providing the Commission with information,
advice and recommendations necessary to give effect to Articles X, XXI, XXII and
XXIV of the Convention.
2. The Committee shall:
(i) review and assess Contracting Parties’ implementation of, and compliance with,
conservation and management measures adopted by the Commission;
(ii) review and assess, as appropriate, the implementation of, and compliance with,
conservation and management measures by those non-Contracting Parties which
have agreed to apply such measures;
(iii) provide technical advice and recommendations on means to promote the effective
implementation of, and compliance with, conservation and management
measures;
(iv) review and analyse information pertaining to activities of Contracting Parties and
non-Contracting Parties which undermine the objectives of the Convention,
including in particular illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing, and
recommend actions to be taken by the Commission to prevent, deter and eliminate
such activities;
(v) review the operation of, and recommend priorities of and improvements to, the
System of Inspection and, in association with the Scientific Committee, as
appropriate, the Scheme of International Scientific Observation;
(vi) exchange information with the Scientific Committee and its subsidiary bodies as
well as the Standing Committee on Administration and Finance (SCAF), as
appropriate, on matters of relevance for the exercise of their respective functions;
(vii) provide the Commission with recommendations on appropriate interaction with
other fisheries or conservation management, technical or scientific organisations
on matters of relevance to the effective implementation of, and compliance with,
conservation and management measures;
(viii) perform such other functions consistent with its terms of reference as the
Commission might decide; and
(ix) prepare a report on its activities and recommendations, as well as an agenda for its
next meeting, for consideration by the Commission.

Following the Norwegian-Chinese krill project (NorChiK) undertaken in Area 48.2 a work
shop was arranged at the Institute of marine Research (IMR), Bergen during 6-7.04.2011 to
investigate the basis for integrated investigations and evaluation of krill resources in the areas
48.2.

The standard procedure used to extract catch-weighted length frequencies can only make use of CCAMLR data for D. eleginoides in Subarea 48.3 collected in the seasons 1992/93 and from 1994/95 onwards. The procedure cannot use the earlier data collected between 1984/85 and 1991/93, and data from 1993/94 because of a mismatch in Flag State which presently occurs between the length and catch data. A new procedure was developed which can use the mismatched data. In addition, historic data from 1986/87 to 1988/89 were entered in the CCAMLR database. The new procedure and recent data entry have extended the existing time series of catch-weighted length frequencies for D. eleginoides in Subarea 48.3 by nine (9) seasons. In all, data are now available for 21 seasons from 1984/85 to 2004/05. New data from the 2005/06 season will be added as soon as submitted. A comparison between the standard procedure and the new procedure indicates that the catchweighted length frequencies are similar where there is an overlap of seasons. However there is a systematic difference in the overall number of fish estimated each season. The basic procedure generally estimates fewer fish than the standard procedure and the difference between the two procedures is typically 5-10% (range: 1 to 34%). 

We provide an update of the Bayesian sex and age structured population stock assessment model for Antarctic toothfish (Dissostichus mawsoni) in the Ross Sea (Subareas 88.1 and SSRUs 88.2A–B), by including tag-recapture data for 2005–06 from New Zealand vessels. The updated assessment resulted in a similar, though slightly higher, estimate of initial and current biomass as the 2005 base case model. The inclusion of the 2005 release and the 2006 recapture data had the effect of only slightly modifying the estimates from the models, suggesting that the new data had a similar pattern to that of previous years.

Model sensitivities using tag-recapture data from all vessels, revised biological parameters, and an alternative method of parameterising the tag-release data are also presented. Inclusion of ‘all vessels’ tagging data resulted in a much more optimistic assessment, but was due to the increased numbers scanned, but smaller increase in the reported numbers recaptured. It is likely that this assessment would change once the outstanding tag release and tag recapture data are used within the analysis.

The assessment using the revised biological parameters was slightly more optimistic in terms of B0 than the 2006 reference case, with the use of the lower M (0.13 y-1 rather than 0.15 y-1) resulting in a more optimistic estimate of B0. However, as the changes in growth, length-weight, and M all imply slightly lower productivity, the yield estimate from the revised parameters model are likely to be slightly lower than for the 2006 reference case.

As for the 2005 base cases, model fits to the data were mostly adequate, with the tag-release and recapture data providing the most information on stock size.