The SAFS assessments have provided assurance to seafood buyers regarding the stock status of many key Australian species and is a respected source of information used by the broader Australian community, including third party certification schemes,environmental NGOs, government, seafood retailers and food service companies.

However, the undefined status poses a problem for these stakeholders as they would like to buy many of these species but are constrained by how the interpretation of "undefined" may be viewed. The risk is that the stock may be overfished, underfished, it has no access to certification and there is no evidence base for the community to make an informed option.

There are also other stocks not included in the SAFS and falling under state jurisidictions which are also classified as undefined or unknown.

Given the variety of methods available, there is benefit of gaining agreement amongst scientists working in this area of methods to assess undefined stocks based on (a) the data and (b) the resources available. In some cases catch data may be available, but the resources required for catch only models may not be available. Also important is to increase focus on testing the performance of methods proposed for the assessment of data deficient fisheries (not a shortage of methods so much as a shortage of rigorous tests) . Gaining agreement on a risk based approach with agreed understanding on the interpretations of this approach would benefit SAFS users.