A pelagic fishery for Sebastes mentella has developed in the Norwegian Sea outside EEZs since 2004. This fishery is managed by the Northeast Atlantic Fisheries Commis-sion (NEAFC). In the Barents Sea, where fisheries are managed by the Joint Norwegian-Russian Fisheries Commission (JNRFC), there had been no directed fishery for this stock from the 1990s until 2013. A new directed demersal and pelagic fishery was opened in the Norwegian Economic Zone in 2014. The 44th Session of JNRFC decided to split the total TAC among countries as follows: Norway: 72%, Russia: 18%, Third countries: 10% (as bycatch in the fishery protection zone at Svalbard (Spitsbergen): 4.1%, and international waters of the Norwegian Sea (NEAFC-area): 5.9%). This split was reconducted at the 47th session of JNRFC in 2017, but there is no agreement be-tween JNRFC and NEAFC concerning this split.
No management plan exists for this stock. From 1995 to 2012, the ICES advice had been no directed catch/lowest possible level. From 2013 onwards, the basis of the advice has been somewhat ad hoc and has varied (F0.1 in 2013, status quo catch in 2014, precautionary approach in 2015–2018).
ICES was requested to test a wide range of harvest control rules for this stock. The request is given in Annex 1 and the list of participants in Annex 2.
This working group was conducted by correspondence, with reviewer comments available after the draft report was finalized. We have therefore inserted some sections to address the comments and concerns.