Atlantic cod

Gadus morhua

5: Avoid How we work out the ratings

What to check for

Location

Kattegat

Technical location

Atlantic, Northeast, Kattegat

Caught by

Bottom trawl (otter)

Rating summary

Default red rating : Cod in the Kattegat is at a historically low level, as is recruitment of young fish entering the stock, and the advice is for 0 catch in 2020. Fishing pressure has recently increased. Cod is mainly caught as bycatch in the Nephrops fishery. While there used to be incentives for highly selective gear that would reduce cod catches, these have been removed. Discards of cod include a high proportion of young fish (aged 1 and 2). There is no management or recovery plan in place for this stock, resulting in a Critical Fail.Rating last updated: July 2020

How we worked out this Rating

The cod stock in the Kattegat is in a poor state, and it is recommended that there should be zero catch in 2020 and 2021.

The stock assessment is indicative of trends only, and reference points have not been defined for biomass or fishing pressure. However, spawning-stock biomass (SSB) has decreased since 2015 and it is at an historically low level in 2020. Fishing mortality has increased since 2015. Recruitment (R) in the last six years has been below average, with some small spikes in 2017 and 2020.

From 2002-2015, advice for this stock was 0 catch, but throughout this period TACs were set and catches continued. In 2020 and 2021 the stock has again returned to 0 catch advice, following ICES' precautionary approach.

Unreported catches have historically been a concern for this stock, and have been estimated as part of the unaccounted removals in the assessment model. Unaccounted removals also include North Sea cod, which use the area as nursery and migrate back to the North Sea for spawning, as well as possible increased natural mortality from seal predation. It is not possible to estimate relative contributions of fishing mortality, natural mortality and migration and so the level of fishing mortality remains unknown.

Cod has a medium resilience to fishing pressure.

References

Froese R. and Pauly D. (Editors), 2020. Gadus morhua, Atlantic cod. Available at: https://www.fishbase.se/summary/Gadus-morhua.html [Accessed on 02.07.2020].

ICES. 2019. Baltic Sea Ecoregion - “ Fisheries Overview. Version 2: 29 November 2019. In Report of the ICES Advisory Committee, 2019. ICES Advice 2019, section 4.2. 28 pp. Available at https://www.ices.dk/sites/pub/Publication%20Reports/Advice/2019/2019/BalticSeaEcoregion_FisheriesOverviews.pdf [Accessed on 30.06.2020].

ICES. 2020. Cod (Gadus morhua) in Subdivision 21 (Kattegat). In Report of the ICES Advisory Committee, 2020. ICES Advice 2020, cod.27.21. Available at https://doi.org/10.17895/ices.advice.5903 [Accessed on 02.07.2020].

ICES. 2020. Baltic Fisheries Assessment Working Group (WGBFAS). ICES Scientific Reports. 2:45. 643 pp. Available at http://doi.org/10.17895/ices.pub.602 [Accessed on 02.07.2020]