Report of the Working Group on the Assessment of Southern Shelf Stocks (WGHMM)

The sub-group complimented the Working Group [WGHMM] on a well-produced report. The report comprises a general introductory chapter and an overview chapter on the stocks assessed by this Working Group. WGHMM is commended for these introductory chapters. The assessment of each stock now includes a section detailing ecosystem aspects which contain useful information and are much appreciated by the reviewers. A number of working papers were presented at the WGHMM meeting in May 2003 that are referenced in the report but were not available to the ACFM sub-group prior to the ACFM meeting. It is strongly recommended that in future relevant information from working papers should be summarised in the main body of the Working Group report in order to facilitate the review process. A brief synopsis of each working paper given in an appendix would also be appreciated. The reviewers in the ACFM sub-group thought that the perception of the historical development of the stocks assessed could suffer from the low quality of earlier data used in the assessment. The Working Group is asked to consider this in their future assessments and also to comment on the appropriateness of present stock boundaries.