The Fisheries Resources Division (FRD), working jointly with California Department of Fish and Game
, conducts stock assessments and recruitment research in support of management of Pacific sardine, chub mackerel, northern anchovy, market squid and krill. These species are managed or monitored by the Pacific Fishery Management Council
under the CPS ( Coastal Pelagics) Fishery Management Plan (FMP) .
Our goal is to acquire sufficient understanding of the California Current pelagic ecosystem so as to predict
most likely
biological responses to changing environmental conditions. The stock assessments conducted allow the Pacific Fishery Management Council to manage harvested species in the context of these changes
and
in the context of the pelagic food web. In addition, FRD strives to implement the long-term strategic goal of an ecosystem approach to fisheries management.
Other important coastal pelagic species, (bonito, yellowtail, barracuda, white seabass, etc.) occur in Southern California waters (U.S.) and Baja California (Mexico) waters. However, since they are not in a Federal plan, they are currently not the focus of FRD research. Annual assessments depend upon CalCOFI
surveys to provide fishery independent measures of abundance. Cooperative work and sharing of data with Mexican scientists on CPS has been ongoing for over 40 years through the CalCOFI
program. More recently, MEXUS-Pacifico, a Federal program, has become the official forum for fishery discussions between the governments of Mexico and the U.S. A May 2000 workshop on sardine (Sardine Symposium 2000), recommended a new forum for international sardine collaboration and information exchange, called the Trinational Sardine Forum. Meetings of this Forum have occurred annually since 2001, and involve academia, government, and industry from Canada, Mexico and the U.S.