Once species have been organized by vulnerability and depletion (and management baskets have been created/ representative species selected if working in a multispecies fishery), managers, scientists, and fishers can work together to agree on an appropriate prioritization scheme – i.e. which cells/ baskets should be considered a high priority for further assessment and potentially immediate precautionary management, which are low priority, and can continue to be fished as they have been without additional examination or management action in the immediate term, and which fall in the middle of this spectrum. See Tables 2a and 2b for examples.
Management guidance can also be developed for each cell, basket, or prioritization class (i.e., all the “Medium Priority” cells) at this time. Conversations with local fishery stakeholders and managers to determine correct management guidance for each cell/basket is recommended. Management guidance will vary depending on the value of the stock(s) for fishing and for other uses (e.g., tourism, recreational fishing or ecological role), risk tolerance and special status (i.e., threatened or endangered species).
STEP 6, TABLE 2a | PRIORITIZATION MATRIX
STEP 6, TABLE 2b | PRIORITIZATION MATRIX WITH MANAGEMENT BASKETS (FOR MULTISPECIES FISHERIES)
When working with management baskets in a multispecies fishery, managers may choose to prioritize and generate management guidance based on baskets rather than based on cells of the species organization matrix. Note that doing so may result in different guidance for some species than would have been provided based on individual cells, depending on how baskets are created, and which species are selected as representatives. For instance, in the example above, with management baskets organized as in Table 2b, the skipjack tuna and the silk snapper have both be assigned different guidance (”Potential for increased harvest”) than they would have been based on Table 2a, above, because they are grouped into baskets with species in different cells of the table. Note also that in each case where the determination is made that more assessment and/or monitoring is warranted, only the representative species for that basket (the species highlighted in yellow) would actually be assessed and monitored, and its scores and results would be used to make decisions about all species in its basket.