Moving Forward with the New Krill Management Strategy

ARK supports the implementation of new surveys for krill, conducted in collaboration with the fishing industry, in strata and periods required for adequately managing the fishery. As such, ARK recommends the prompt development of the following:

• Develop an explicit survey design for estimating krill biomass on each of the seven strata identified in SC-CAMLR-41, figure 1.
• Consider the use of existing (commercial) nets for sampling krill length frequency in conjunction with the new krill sampling protocols developed this year.
• Continue developing alternatives for acoustic calibration (e.g., bottom calibration) to increase the number of platforms involved in surveys.
• The new management strategy aims for closer fishery management at the temporal and spatial scales at which the fishery operates. Hence, survey time should be during the core period in which the fishery is active in that region. For Subarea 48.1, this means conducting surveys during March-May.
• Implement a Daily Catch and Effort Reporting System when the quota assigned, or left in a stratum, is smaller than 30 000 tonnes. Additionally, implement daily fishery closure notifications when the quota left is ~10 000 tonnes.
• Implement the new catch limit recommendations by WG-FSA-2022 in a staged approach, based on the amount of survey information available for each stratum.