Report of the Study Group on Integration of Economics, Stock Assessment and Fisheries Management (SGIMM)

Ecosystem based fishery management has moved beyond rhetorical statements call-ing for a more holistic approach to resource management, to implementing decisions on resource use that are compatible with goals of maintaining ecosystem health and resilience. Coupled economic-ecological models are a primary tool for informing these decisions. Recognizing the importance of these models, the Study Group on Integration of Economics, Stock Assessment and Fisheries Management (SGIMM) has been formed to explore alternative modelling approaches that bring the multiple dis-ciplines of economics, ecology, and stock assessment into integrated ecosystem mod-els. This year the group has not physically met, but worked through correspondence and through two special theme sessions at international conferences. The first session was held at the World Fisheries Congress (WFC) in Edinburgh, Scotland, 7–11 May 2012. The session “Sustainable Fisheries: Ecological – Economic Modelling Tools to be used in integrated fish stock and fisheries management” focused on the biological parts of the models. The second session “Coupled Economic-Ecological Models for Ecosystem-Based Fishery Management: Exploration of Trade- offs Between Model Complexity and Management Needs” at the conference of the International Institute for Fisheries Economics and Trade (IIFET) from 16 to 20 July 2012 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, highlighted the economic components of coupled models in presentations and a panel discussion.