13 February 2018: Report of the Global Review of Monodontids is now available

We are pleased to announce that the report of the Global Review of Monodontids meeting which was held in March 2017 is now available. You can access the full report here.

A big thank you to all of the participants for their hard work during the meeting, and after the meeting to get this report finalised.

The previous reviews of belugas and narwhals (IWC 1992, 1999 and NAMMCO 1999) are about 20 years old, and a large amount of new information has become available since that time – particularly on stock identity, movements, abundance, and threats to the populations. Additionally, many new stressors have emerged in the last 20 years, especially related to climate change.

The GROM recognised 22 beluga stocks, and 12 narwhal stocks. In some cases, these are different than the stocks recognised in previous reviews, but these stock delineations are the most up-to-date according to the experts at the meeting.

Participants provided “Stock Review” papers prior to the meeting which gave information on abundance, trend, any calculations on sustainability of removals, and habitat concerns. The GROM reviewed these Stock Reviews for each stock and used this information, along with decisions of quality of the data available (e.g. whether the abundance was based on a survey versus expert opinion) and assigned a status of concern ­– high, moderate, or low — relative to the other stocks in that species.