Report of the Working Group on the Assessment of Southern Shelf Stocks of Hake, Monk and Megrim (WGHMM)

It was decided at the 91st Annual Science Conference that the Working Group on the Assessment of Southern Stocks of Hake Monk and Megrim [WGHMM] (Chair: V. Trujillo Spain) would meet at ICES Headquarters from 12–21 May

2004 though due to logistic problems it was finally decided meet at Gijón (Spain) to:

a) assess the status of and provide catch options for 2005 for stocks of hake in Subareas III, IV, VI, VII, VIII, and

IX, monk (anglerfish) and megrim in Subareas VII, VIII, and IX;

b) consider and implement the proposed methodology for projection of yield by fisheries made by the Study

Group on the Development of Fishery-based Forecasts (this group meets in February) based on the data

compiled through this Study Group. The Group should present a limited set of fisheries-based catch options;

c) provide specific information on possible deficiencies in the 2004 assessments including, at least, any major

inadequacies in the data on catches, effort or discards; any major inadequacies in research vessel surveys data,

and any major difficulties in model formulation, including inadequacies in available software. The

consequences of these deficiencies for assessment of the status of the stocks and for the projection should be

clarified;

d) evaluate the effect of the Northern hake emergency measures;

e) evaluate new information on the potential effectiveness of sorting grids to reduce the mortality of all small fish

in the monkfish fishery;

f) comment on this meeting’s assessments compared to the last assessment of the same stock, for stocks for

which a full or update assessment is presented;

g) document fully the methods to be applied in subsequent update assessments and list factors that would warrant

reconsideration of doing an update, and consider doing a benchmark ahead of schedule for stocks for which

benchmark assessments are done.

WGHMM will report by 22 May 2004 for the attention of ACFM (October 2004).