Report of the Study Group on Survey Trawl Gear for the IBTS Western and Southern Areas (SGSTS)

The Study Group on Survey Trawl Standardisation (SGSTS) was set up develop recommenda-tions and protocols to improve standardisation and hence quality assurance in the use and de-sign of survey trawls within and beyond the ICES area. As such the group was planned to take up the work of a previous study group (The Study Group on Survey Trawl Gear for the IBTS Western and Southern Areas) and to develop this. The first term of reference below encom-passed this aim and was broken down in subsequent ToR.a) review and report on the current status of survey trawl design, recent developments in design, and new technologies which could be suitable for application in revised survey trawl designs, aiming to reduce trawl performance variability or for use in absolute abundance estimation, for example;The second ToR was to address a standardization programme:b) design and discuss the implementation of a generic ICES survey trawl standardiza-tion programme for all survey bottom trawls inside and outside the ICES areas;