Members of the Commission currently include 25 States and the European Union. The Status of the Convention is maintained by the Depositary, Australia. Contact details for CCAMLR Members are provided below.
SG-ASAM was established by the Scientific Committee as an expert group to examine issues relating to hydroacoustic surveys of Antarctic krill. Each of the meetings of the sub-group have had specific terms of reference from the Scientific Committee as a result of a specific issue where expert evaluation of acoustic techniques has been required.
In 2019 it became a full working group: WG-ASAM (SC-CAMLR-39, paragraph 2.36 and CCAMLR-39, paragraph 5.6).
The current Co-conveners are Dr Sophie Fielding (United Kingdom) and Dr Xinliang Wang (China).
In response to concerns over the decline in albatross populations, and the potential for this to be exacerbated by interactions with CCAMLR fisheries, the Commission undertook initial discussion in 1991 and 1992 and convened a meeting of relevant experts on seabirds and longline fishing in 1993. One of the outcomes of this meeting was the creation of an ad hoc Working Group on Incidental Mortality Arising from Longline Fishing (later to become Incidental Mortality Associated with Fishing (IMAF)).
In 2001, WG-FSA identified the difficulties that arose when new quantitative methodologies are introduced and incorporated into assessments undertaken during the time of a single meeting. As a result, the WG-FSA Subgroup on Assessment Methods (WG-FSA-SAM) was established in order to provide an opportunity to provide time for a thorough evaluation of new assessment methods prior to their use at WG-FSA.