In March 2023, COLTO sponsored and organised a COLTO–CCAMLR Tagging Workshop, which was held at the CCAMLR Secretariat in Hobart, Australia, from 14 to 17 March. The Workshop included both meeting room discussions and a hands-on wet-lab component tagging toothfish at the University of Tasmania biological sciences laboratory.
The Workshop was co-convened by Rhys Arangio (COLTO) and Dr Chris Jones (USA), and was the first time an official CCAMLR workshop had been co-convened by a non-CCAMLR Member (i.e. COLTO). There were 28 participants which included 12 COLTO industry representatives from 8 companies (and 6 different vessel flags), 5 Scientific Committee scientists, 2 CCAMLR Secretariat scientists, 7 representatives from national observer programs, as well as an invited expert from Hallprint (CCAMLR tag provider) and a tuna/game fish tagger from the US. Overall, 9 CCAMLR Member nations were represented in some way.
As well as agreeing on several recommendations for CCAMLR Working Groups and the Scientific Committee to work on, the workshop achieved its objective of exchanging information amongst those with expertise in toothfish and skate tagging and handling which allowed the development of best practice guidelines for tagging in CCAMLR longline fisheries. The longer-term goal for CCAMLR having this workshop was to improve survival of tagged fish, reporting of recaptured fish, and quality of recorded data.
The outputs from the workshop included:
– easy to understand toothfish and skate tagging posters for vessels to display on board;
– a synthesised 1 page ‘tagging protocol’, that makes clearer a reference within CM 41-01 (which can also be displayed on board at the tagging station); and
– identifying what best practice looks like throughout the tagging process, which will be included in an updated CCAMLR tagging training manual and training video.
The full workshop report can be found here.
