Updated assessments of the central stock of minke whales in the North East Atlantic

Abstract

Assessments of the Central stock of minke whales developed at earlier NAMMCO Scientific Committee meetings are updated given further data in the form of new estimates of abundance from surveys. Results obtained do not differ greatly from those of earlier analyses if variance weighted estimates of abundance from 3 sets of surveys over the past 20 years are used. HITTER based assessments suggest that the Central stock of minke whales is close to its pre-exploitation level (not less than 10% below this). However, if the only estimates of abundance from the 2007 surveys are used, HITTER assessments suggest that the Central stock of minke whales is within the range of 70 to near 100% of its pre-exploitation level, depending on the possible MSYR and abundance estimate values used. Projections are provided for various levels of constant annual catches for the next 10 years.