ADMAR Adaptive Management of Living Marine Resources by Integrating Different Data Sources, 2012

The Norwegian Ocean Resource Act "Havressursloven" of 2009 is a formal implementation of the Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries. This requires explicit management action towards both data rich and data poor stocks, including those of minor commercial importance. The overall goal of this project is to enhance knowledge of ecosystem functioning and to derive a framework for operational adaptive management. Progress in two directions is required: First, models demand a high level of realism. Different data sources (survey data, fisheries statistics, life history traits, multi species considerations etc.) and error structures must be integrated to derive key parameters and time-series. Further development of stock assessment models by quantifying uncertainties is paramount. Secondly, development of better biological models, which incorporate food-web interactions providing a basic understanding of the ecosystem functioning. Size-based models will be developed to model multi-species dynamics parsimoniously, describing the essential ecological processes that are particularly useful in data-poor situations. We will derive Harvest Control Rules (HCR) for exploited stocks to study the outcome of different harvesting scenarios under varying amounts of information, and to see how a reduction in information affects the most robust HCR. We will also consider different ecological scenarios, where species interactions change within and among species over the course of harvesting and environmental changes. Given these operational models, we will derive a model framework providing scientifically sound advice given the level and quality of the available information. The proposed project will contribute to fundamental science and its application for sustainable management of marine resources.