The IUCN/SSC Shark Specialist Group
Shark News 3: March 1995
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ICES takes action on elasmobranchs
The International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) has
noted a more than 25% drop in elasmobranch landings between the
early 1960s and the mid 1980s (with the exception of spurdogs,
which are generally sustaining yields, despite fluctuations). Levels of
by-catch of non-targeted species discarded and their mortality rates
are unknown, under-utilisation of elasmobranchs (i.e. finning and
liver extraction) has resulted in misleading or non-existent landing
statistics, andmany species are not properly identified in the statistics.
The ICES Demersal Fish Committee therefore recommended, in
September 1994, that a Study Group on Elasmobranch Fishes should
be established. It will meet from 15-18 August 1995 to:
a) review the status of elasmobranch stocks within the Northeast
and Northwest Atlantic and, where possible, identify trends in biomass
and recruitment; b) identify the extent of the commercial and sport
fisheries in which elasmobranchs are targeted or are caught as by-
catch and to estimate the amount (biomass/numbers per size class) of
elasmobranchs taken as catches and lost as discards; c) describe/
review the ecological role of elasmobranch species, their reproductive
dynamics and predation of elasmobranchs taken as catches and lost
as discards; d) co-ordinate techniques of age determination and age
verification of elasmobranchs; e) co-ordinate methods on modelling
and assessment of elasmobranch stocks; f) identify the development
of compensatory mechanisms as a response to exploitation; g)
outline an action plan for attaining the goals set above; h) report
to the Demersal Fish Committee in 1995.
Findings from a, b and c above will be made available to the
ICES Working Group on Ecosystem Effects of Fishing Activities.
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