Terms of Reference

Determination of Reference Points for Status Determination and Associated Allowable Exploitation Rates for Canadian Pacific Salmon Treaty (PST) Southern Coho Management Units

Regional Peer Review Process – Pacific Region

September 20-21, 2017
Nanaimo, British Columbia

Chairperson: Mary Thiess

Context

The current Pacific Salmon Treaty (PST) identifies four Southern BC Coho management units (MU): Interior Fraser River (including Thompson), Lower Fraser, Strait of Georgia Mainland, and Strait of Georgia Vancouver Island.   The objective of the bilateral Canada/US Southern Coho Management Plan, outlined in Annex IV, Chapter 5 of the Treaty, is to manage total fishery exploitation to enable MUs to produce Maximum Sustainable Harvest (MSH) over the long term, while maintaining the genetic and ecological diversity of the component populations and to improve long-term prospects for sustaining healthy fisheries in both countries. For each MU, the current Coho chapter requires the development of management reference points (MRPs) for the determinations of 3 status categories, Low, Moderate and Abundant, as well as associated exploitation rates (ER) for each status that achieves the goals set out in Annex IV, Chapter 5.

Interior Fraser Coho (IFC) is the only Canadian MU where informative escapement data have been collected (DFO 2014), and biological abundance-based benchmarks have been established (DFO 2015a). The PST however, requires that all MUs within the treaty identify MRPs and status associated ER caps. For MUs where escapement information is deficient, escapement-based benchmarks would not be informative.

Previous efforts to address these requirements funded by the Pacific Salmon Commission’s (PSC) Southern Endowment Fund, include development of a pilot Coho harvest optimization model by Ecometric Research Inc. (Korman et al. 2014) in collaboration with the PSC Coho Technical Committee (CoTC), and work undertaken by LGL Ltd. and Ecometric Research in 2014 that examined a habitat-based method to obtain the desired reference points and allowable exploitation (DFO 2015b).  Both of these projects identified that the lack of escapement data prevented the determination of escapement benchmarks that could then be used to establish reference points.

DFO Fisheries Management has requested that Science Branch provide benchmarks and associated reference points for all Southern BC Coho MUs.

The current project builds on this earlier work by exploring alternative assessment methods that make use of marine survival or productivity patterns either separately or in combination with other metrics to establish benchmarks for determining the biological status and associated management reference points for data deficient Canadian MUs. In addition, analytical tools will be developed to enable the evaluation of a range of exploitation rate caps under alternative assumptions about future marine survival or productivity.

The assessment, and advice arising from this Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat (CSAS) Regional Peer Review (RPR), will be used to inform consultations and decision making regarding management  reference points and associated ER caps for three Canadian MU’s; Interior Fraser River, Lower Fraser and Strait of Georgia which is a combination of the current Mainland and Vancouver Island component MUs.

Objectives

The following working paper will be reviewed and provide the basis for discussion and advice on the specific objectives outlined below.

Korman J. and Sawada, J. Determination of Reference Points for Status Determination and Associated Allowable Exploitation Rates for Canadian PST Southern Coho Management Units. CSAP Working Paper 2014SAL03.

The specific objectives of this review are to:

1. Develop and review the methods for identifying Interior Fraser Coho PST MU benchmarks at low, moderate and abundant PST Status categories (stock recruit and marine survival), and evaluate how they meet WSP and IFCRT objectives.
2. Using simulations, determine the likelihood of achieving SR and distributional lower and upper benchmarks across a range of marine survivals and harvest management actions (exploitation rates) for IFC.
3. Review the status categories developed from the marine survival method and evaluate their applicability to data-deficient MUs for Southern BC Coho (i.e. Lower Fraser and Strait of Georgia).
4. Examine and identify uncertainties, limitations and risks in the data and methods and suggest potential approaches to their mitigation.

Expected Publications

• Science Advisory Report
• Proceedings
• Research Document

Expected Participation

• Fisheries and Oceans Canada (Aquatic Resources Research and Assessment, Ecosystems and Fisheries Management)
• Academia
• First Nations
• Recreational and Commercial Fishing Representatives
• PSC Coho Technical Committee
• Canadian Southern Panel, Coho Working Group
• Marine Conservation Caucus representatives

References

DFO. 2014. Assessment of the interior Fraser River Coho Salmon Management Unit. DFO Can. Sci. Advis. Sec. Sci. Advis. Rep. 2014/032.

DFO. 2015a. Wild salmon policy biological status assessment for conservation units of interior Fraser River Coho Salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch). DFO Can. Sci. Advis. Sec. Sci. Advis. Rep. 2015/022.

DFO. 2015b. Habitat-based escapement benchmarks for Coho Salmon in Georgia Strait Mainland, Georgia Strait Vancouver Island, and Lower Fraser River Management Units. DFO Can. Sci. Advis. Sec. Sci. Advis. Rep. 2015/045.

Korman, J. and Tompkins, A. 2014. Comparison of the Fishery and Conservation Performance of Fixed- and Abundance-Based Exploitation Regimes for Coho Salmon in Southern British Columbia. DFO Can. Sci. Advis. Sec. Res. Doc. 2014/090. viii +39p.