Report of the JOINT EIFAAC/ICES/GFCM Working group on eels (WGEEL)

Abstract

The Joint EIFAAC/ICES/GFCM Working group on eels (WGEEL) met in a split meeting from 09-13 September (online) and 23 September–01 October 2024 (hybrid meeting) in Tirana, Albania to provide the scientific basis for the ICES advice on fishing opportunities and conservation aspects for the European eel and further address requests from EIFAAC and GFCM, if brought to the attention of the group. WGEEL assessed the state of the European eel and its fisheries (Section 2), collated biometric data, reviewed the implementation of the Workshop on the Future of Eel Advice (WKFEA) roadmap, identified issues for the future benchmark process, reported on any updates to the scientific basis of the advice, new and emerging threats or opportunities. After high levels in the late 1970s, the recruitment declined dramatically in the 1980s and remains low. Compared to 1960–1979, the recruitment in the “North Sea” index series was 1.1% in 2024 (provisional) and 0.5% in 2023 (updated). In the “Elsewhere Europe” index series, it was 7.2% in 2024 (provisional) and 7.4% in 2023 (updated). For the yellow eel data series, recruitment in 2023 was 11.4%. The time-series from 1980 to 2024 show that glass eel recruitment remains at a very low level. The trend of reported commercial landings shows a long-term continuing decline, from a level of around 10 000 t in the 1960s and remained above 2 000 t (glass eel + yellow eel + silver eel) in the past decade. The commercial glass eel fishery in 2024 was 56.1 and 54 t in 2023. Spain was the only country allowing a recreational catch of glass eel in 2023, with landings estimated at 1.3 t, but banned recreational fisheries in 2024. Reported landings from yellow and silver eel commercial fisheries (Y, S, YS) add up to 2 366 t in 2022 and 2 027 t in 2023 (provisional data). Reported recreational landings for yellow and silver eel combined was 551 t for 2022 (15 coun-tries reporting) and 84 t for 2023 (10 countries reporting). Contents of the country reports were reviewed to update the scientific basis of the advice, in-cluding any new or emerging threats or opportunities (Section 3). Current threats to the eel pop-ulation were briefly described within the following categories: hydropower, screening and pas-sage, eel health parameters, climate change and invasive aquatic species. A dedicated section also highlighted the need to consider the risks associated with a prospective closure of the eel lifecycle in captivity (i.e. artificial reproduction). Ongoing eel or eel-related projects were also described in this section. In 2021, the Workshop on the Future of Eel Advice (WKFEA) defined milestones toward an im-proved eel assessment targeting a full benchmark process in 2027. The progress towards the im-plementation of the roadmap established by WKFEA was evaluated and updated accordingly. Issues to be addressed during the future benchmark were defined and described in Section 4. Other tasks carried out during the meeting (Section 5) consisted in: clarifying the process for the integration the WGEEL database into the ICES Data Screening Utility (DATSU), establishing a questionnaire for the next datacall in preparation for the benchmark, and preparing for the tech-nical evaluation of EU Member States’ Progress Reports (WKEMP).