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SC/69B/SH/05Rev1
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Resource ID
22148
Access
Open
Document Number
SC/69B/SH/05Rev1
Full Title
Annual Report of the Southern Ocean Research Partnership (IWC-SORP) 2023/24
Author
Compiler: Elanor M Bell
Publisher
IWC
Publication Year
2024
Abstract
The Southern Ocean Research Partnership (IWC-SORP) is a multi-lateral, non-lethal scientific research programme established in 2009 to improve the coordinated and cooperative delivery of science to the IWC. There are 13 Partners: Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Chile, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa, and the United States. This paper reports on the continued progress of IWC-SORP and its seven Commission-endorsed research themes1 in 2023/24. Progress includes publication of >20 peer-reviewed scientific papers, bringing the total number produced since the start of the initiative to ca. 311. Moreover, 218 IWC-SORP related papers have been submitted to the Scientific Committee, >10 of them this year. IWC-SORP has directly contributed to at least 21 PhD, 17 Masters and 17 honours theses and the work of at least 5 postdoctoral fellows.
The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted all IWC-SORP projects but field and lab work resumed in earnest in 2023/24. Fieldwork was conducted around the western Antarctic Peninsula, the waters off the Australian Research Stations Mawson and Davis, sub-Antarctic Marion Island and Prince Edwards Islands, Saint Paul and Amsterdam Islands, in the waters off South Africa, eastern and Western Australia, New Zealand, Chile and around Pen nsula Vald s, Argentina. Southern right whale aerial surveys occurred in South Africa, Australia and Brazil. Images for photo-identification were collected; satellite tags deployed on killer whales, southern right, fin whales and blue whales; biopsy samples collected from killer, humpback, southern right, fin, Antarctic minke and humpback whales; long-term acoustic moorings were deployed and hundreds of hours of cetacean acoustic recordings made and analysed.