An evaluation of acceptable biological catch (ABC) harvest control rules designed to limit overfishing

Abstract

In this paper we developed a simulation model to evaluate a range of acceptable biological catch (ABC) control rules to determine their relative performance at achieving common fishery management objectives. We explored a range of scenarios to determine robustness of a control rule to different situations and found that across scenarios the control rules that used a buffer to account for scientific uncertainty when setting the ABC were able to limit the frequency of overfishing. Modest buffers when setting the ABC were generally effective at limiting overfishing, but larger buffers resulted in higher average biomass, similar long-term benefits to the fishery (high yield, low variability in yield), more rapid recovery of depleted populations, and a lower risk of the population being overfished, and these results were robust to the level of uncertainty in the assessment model estimates. In addition, fixing the ABC over the interval between assessments and having a short interval between assessments was generally more effective at meeting management objectives than using projections and having a long assessment interval.

Developing Precautionary Reference Points for Fishery Management Using Robust Control Theory: Application to the Chesapeake Bay Blue Crab Callinectes sapidus Fishery

“…The approach we propose could be used to evaluate how alternative levels of precaution would affect management choices. For example, Wiedenmann et al (2017) evaluated several alternative levels of precaution for the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council's harvest control rule and found that the effects of adopting more precaution differed among life history and data quality scenarios. We believe that the precaution levels in our analyses are more intuitive with respect to what they are attempting to achieve than those of other approaches to calculating precautionary reference points.…”

Scientific Considerations Informing Magnuson–Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act Reauthorization

“…Most stock assessments likely underestimate the uncertainty inherent in OFL estimates (Ralston et al 2011), and this negatively impacts the performance of many of the control rules used to manage fisheries (Wiedenmann et al 2017;Punt et al 2018). This variability means that estimates of OFL should really be considered probability distributions around the true point estimate.…”

“…This variability means that estimates of OFL should really be considered probability distributions around the true point estimate. Most stock assessments likely underestimate the uncertainty inherent in OFL estimates (Ralston et al 2011), and this negatively impacts the performance of many of the control rules used to manage fisheries (Wiedenmann et al 2017;Punt et al 2018). NMFS revised the guidelines for National Standard 1 (74 FR 3178; 81 FR 7185873) in 2009 and again in 2016 to provide guidance to SSCs and the RFMCs on how the inherent management and scientific uncertainty should be incorporated into establishing annual catch limits (OFLs, ABCs, and ACLs) and associated accountability measures.…”

Fisheries Volume 43 Number 11 November 2018

“…This variability means that estimates of OFL should really be considered probability distributions around the true point estimate. Most stock assessments likely underestimate the uncertainty inherent in OFL estimates (Ralston et al 2011 ), and this negatively impacts the performance of many of the control rules used to manage fi sheries (Wiedenmann et al 2017 ;Punt et al 2018 ). NMFS revised the guidelines for National Standard 1 (74 FR 3178;81 FR 7185873) in 2009 and again in 2016 to provide guidance to SSCs and the RFMCs on how the inherent management and scientifi c uncertainty should be incorporated into establishing annual catch limits (OFLs, ABCs, and ACLs) and associated accountability measures.…”