Establishment and development of the Coordinating Working Party

The FAO Conference at its Tenth Session in 1959 adopted Resolution 23/59 under which the Conference (i) noted with satisfaction that the Edinburgh Meeting had "agreed on recommendations to governments and international organizations designed' to improve and considerably simplify the collection and reporting of fishery statistics in the North Atlantic area"; and (ii) accepted that "FAO should transmit its report to the governments and international organizations concerned, with the request that they consider implementation of the recommendations contained in it."

In the same Resolution the Conference (i) welcomed the suggestion for the establishment of a Continuing Working Party on Fishery Statistics in the North Atlantic Area with the role as specified in paragraph 8 (ii) above, and (ii) agreed that the "Working Party should consist of one government expert each nominated by the Governments of Canada, Germany, Iceland and the United Kingdom, one expert each nominated by the Secretary-General of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea and the Executive Secretary of the International Commission of the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries, one expert nominated by the Director General of FAO, and such additional experts as may be nominated by the Working Party itself". Finally, the Resolution authorized and requested "the Director General to establish the Working Party in accordance with Article VI of the FAO Constitution and to arrange for the FAO Fisheries Division to function as secretariat for the Working Party".

Subsequently, ICES and ICNAF agreed to participate in and support the CWP and the four national governments agreed to provide experts to participate.

After five Sessions of the Working Party, discussions took place within the CWP, as well as ICNAF, ICES and the FAO Committee on Fisheries on how to "rotate and widen participation" in the sessions of the CWP. In response to a recommendation from the Third Session of the Committee on Fisheries, the FAO Council, at its Fifty-first Session (1968, Resolution 1/51), altered the title of the Working Party to the Coordinating Working Party on Atlantic Fishery Statistics (similarly abbreviated to CWP) and decided that it would be "... composed of experts; FAO, ICES and ICNAF each appointing up to four experts in accordance with their respective constitutional procedures". The FAO Council noted that proposals for the exchanges had been approved by ICES (by the Bureau) and by ICNAF (at its 18th Annual Meeting). The FAO Council also (i) confirmed that as far as FAO was concerned the CWP was a working party of experts established under Article VI-2 of the Constitution, (ii) authorised the Director-General of FAO, in accordance with Article VI-3 of the Constitution, to determine the terms of reference of the CWP in agreement with ICES and ICNAF and to promulgate amended statutes to reflect the contents of the present resolutions, and (iii) agreed that FAO should continue to provide the secretariat services for the Working Party.

The CWP was reconstituted in 1995 in order to better respond to the increasing demands for reliable fishery statistics such as those resulting from the 1995 UN Agreement for the Implementation of the Provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982 Relating to the Conservation and Management of Straddling Fish Stocks and Highly Migratory Fish Stocks, as well as the 1993 Agreement to Promote Compliance with International Conservation and Management Measures by Fishing Vessels on the High Seas and the Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries and to extend its remit beyond the Atlantic.

With the remit of the re-constituted CWP no longer limited to the Atlantic, several additional regional fishery bodies became participating organizations of CWP: SPC and IWC joined in 1997, CCSBT in 1998, IOTC in 1999 and IATTC in 2000.