6. CLASSIFICATION OF WHALE STOCKS AND THEIR MANAGEMENT

(from "Chairman's Report of the Twenty-Eighth Meeting")


The three categories adopted by the Commission last year as the basis for the classification of whale stocks were reviewed.

(a) Sustained Management Stock

(i)
The Scientific Committee had been asked to compare the alternative proposals for determining quotas put forward last year by the Scientific Committee and the Commissioner from the United Kingdom. They reported that the rate of rebuilding under the UK scheme was slightly faster than with the Scientific Committee's proposal, but noted that the risks resulting from errors of assessment are greater in the UK scheme.

The Technical Committee recommended by a majority vote that the UK scheme which provides an exception in paragraph 6(a) of the Schedule for sei and Bryde's whales in the Southern Hemisphere should be deleted, and this was accepted by the Commission.

(ii)
Iceland submitted a memorandum which set out the reasons for proposing a continuation of the long-standing effort limitation on her shore-based fishery. The Scientific Committee reviewed this document and preferred to set catch quotas as the safest approach to management. They suggested two possible quota systems and the Technical Committee recommended a six year block with the limit in any one year to be the average plus 50 whales. The Commission adopted this proposal.


(b) Initial Management Stock
No changes were adopted by the Commission but Japan pointed out that under the existing formula for calculating the permitted catch the stocks of male sperm whales in most Divisions of the Southern Hemisphere would take many years to be reduced to the Sustained Management category and in some Divisions would never reach that level. The matter was referred to the Scientific Committee for further study during the next year.


(c) Protection Stock
No changes were made.


The Commission accepted the recommendation of the Technical Committee for the following classification of the whale stocks proposed by the Scientific Committee for the 1976-77 Antarctic season and the 1977 season elsewhere:

Sustained Management Stocks
Fin whales North Atlantic (East Greenland - Iceland stock)
Sei whales Southern Hemisphere Areas I, II, IV, V, VI
Minke whales North Pacific (Western stock)
Minke whales North Atlantic (North American coast, East Greenland, East Atlantic stocks)
Sperm whales - males Southern Hemisphere Divisions 3, 5
Sperm whales - females Southern Hemisphere Divisions 2, 3, 6, 7
Sperm whales North Atlantic


Initial Management Stocks

Fin whales North Atlantic (Newfoundland - Labrador stock)
Bryde's whales Southern Hemisphere all Areas
Bryde's whales North Pacific
Minke whales Southern Hemisphere all Areas
Minke whales North Pacific (Except the Western stock)
Sperm whales - males Southern Hemisphere Divisions 1, 2, 4, 6, 8
Sperm whales - females Southern Hemisphere Divisions 1, 5, 8
Sperm whales - males North Pacific
Sperm whales - females North Pacific

The Scientific Committee will be asked to classify the North Pacific sperm whales by suitable sub-units in future years to prevent excessive catches being taken from small areas.


Protection Stocks

Blue whales All oceans
Humpback whales All oceans
Right whales All oceans
Gray whales All oceans
Fin whales Southern Hemisphere all Areas
Fin whales North Pacific
Fin whales North Atlantic (West Norway - Faroe, Nova Scotia stocks)
Sei whales Southern Hemisphere Area III
Sei whales North Pacific
Sei whales North Atlantic (Nova Scotia stock)
Sperm whales - male Southern Hemisphere Divisions 7, 9
Sperm whales - females Southern Hemisphere Divisions 4, 9

The Scientific Committee had been unable to place some stocks into any of the three management categories shown above because the stocks were too poorly documented for their status to be assessed. The Commission therefore decided that the following stocks should be provisionally listed as Sustained Management Stocks for 1977, pending the accumulation of sufficient information for classification:

Fin whales North Atlantic (North Norway, Spain - Portugal - British Isles stocks)
Sei whales North Atlantic (Iceland - Denmark Strait stock)
Minke whales North Atlantic (West Greenland stock)

The necessary amendments to the Schedule to incorporate all these classifications were approved by the Commission.

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