OCEANCANADA NEWS
Rashid Sumaila Named Canada Research Chair
Rashid has been named Canada Research Chair (Tier 1) in Interdisciplinary Ocean and Fisheries Economics. The Canada Research Chair Program, supported by the Canada Foundation for Innovation, provides funding to support academic research and training excellence. Congratulations, Rashid! Read more here.
Sarah Harper Wins Sumaila-Volvo Graduate Prize
Sarah Harper, HQP at the Fisheries Economics Research Unit (FERU), Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries, UBC, has won the inaugural Sumaila-Volvo Graduate Prize, which recognizes a UBC graduate student whose peer-reviewed publications have the potential to make a significant impact. Sarah’s research focuses on contributions by women in global fisheries economics.
Read more here.
OceanCanada Website Updates
We have recently updated the OceanCanada website with a facelift and many new features, including:
- More detailed publication information, including citations, metrics and keywords.
- Updates to Working Group sections.
- Updates to HQP (Highly Qualified Personnel).
- Breakdown of Cross Cutting Themes.
- Many back-end updates.
Several other new features are being added and will be covered in the next newsletter. Check out the OceanCanada website here.
European Tour – Five Countries in Five Days!
From June 10 to 14, 2019, Rashid Sumaila participated in a European Scientific Listening Tour where he presented preliminary results of UBC subsidies research to different groups in five European capitals with the aim of encouraging leaders in London, Geneva, Brussels, Berlin, and Oslo to push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. See the Presentations section for details.
PARTNER & COLLABORATOR NEWS
Friends of Port Mouton Bay New Publication on Sustainable Aquaculture
Inka Milewski, Dalhousie University, and Ruth Smith, FPMB community research partner, recently published Sustainable Aquaculture in Canada: Lost in Translation, in Marine Policy. Milewski and Smith argue that “there is virtually no evidence to support decades-long narratives about the sustainability of finfish aquaculture in Canada.” The study, supported by OceanCanada funding, “examined the progress Canada has made towards translating sustainable aquaculture policy goals into measurable outcomes.” Read the press release here.
New Oceana Report Based on OceanCanada Study
Oceana Canada recently released the report, Oceans of Opportunity: The Economic Case for Rebuilding Northern Cod. The report, based on the study Economic and Social Benefits of Fisheries Rebuilding by Louise Teh and Rashid Sumaila of OceanCanada, finds that with low fishing pressure and favourable environmental conditions, the northern cod fishery could recover within about a decade and jobs would be increased substantially.
Ecotrust Implements Restorative Ocean Farming
Ecotrust Canada is partnering with local communities and marine industries in Prince Rupert to develop restorative ocean farming where seaweeds and shellfish grow together in ocean plots. The goal is to produce local seafood with reduced energy inputs and space. Restorative Ocean Farming Project Manager Taylor Reidlinger is excited about the future of this local initiative! Read more here.
VIDEO UPDATE
As we announced in the Spring Newsletter, the film Beyond Climate, partially funded by OceanCanada, has been screened in many places around the world:
2019
- Four Seasons Film Festival, London, UK: Won Best Feature Film Award
- Dreamspeakers International Film Festival, Edmonton, Alberta
- Sonoma International Film Festival, California
- Environmental Film Festival in the Nation’s Capital, Washington DC
- Yorkton Film Festival, Saskatchewan
- Albany Film Festival, California
- Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival, British Columbia
- Ethnografilm, Paris
- International Nature Film Festival Gödöllő, Hungary
- Oaxaca FilmFest, Mexico
- Maui Film Festival, Hawai’i: Won World Cinema Documentary Feature
- Colorado International Activism Film Festival, Denver
2018
- Planet in Focus International Environmental Film Festival, Toronto
- Gimme Some Truth Documentary Festival, Winnipeg
- Indie Film Wisconsin Film Festival, Watertown
- CKF International Film Festival, Swindon, UK
- Chambal International Film Festival, Rajasthan, India
- Docs Without Borders Festival
David Sukuki, who narrated the film, and Ian Mauro, director, spoke at a Big Thinking event at the 2019 Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences at UBC: Big Thinking-David Suzuki and Ian Mauro, June 4 2019 – Beyond Climate
MEDIA COVERAGE
August 28. Rashid Sumaila interview with Afedzi Abdullah. Ghana News Agency.
August 20. Govt urged to scrap fuel, subsidies to fisher folks. Ghanian Times.
August 20. Redirect pre-mix fuel subsidy to sustain fisheries resource. GhanaWeb.
August 15. Eight urgent measures proposed to ensure future ocean health. Hellenic Shipping News.
August 14. Don’t want your goldfish anymore? Rehome it on Kijiji. National Post.
August 7. Mercury levels in fish are rising despite reduced emissions. Science News.
July 2. Fisheries subsidies wreck ecosystems, don’t bring them back. Nature.
June 19. Scientists say ocean warming may greatly reduce sea life. Voice of America.
June 19. Conservatives unveil climate change policy. Global News.
June 18. Tàu cá Trung Quốc đe dọa môi trường Biển Đông. Thanh Niên.
June 17. If we don’t stop climate change now, we may not have any fish to eat very soon. India Times.
June 17. Three new CRCs appointed at UBC Science, seven renewed or advanced. UBC Science.
June 16. The rise in seawater temperature will reduce the number of organisms. CCTV.
June 14. UBC researchers among new and renewed Canada Research Chairs. UBC Research + Innovation.
June 13. ‘Opportunity to take action’: climate change may bring 17% loss of sea life by 2100. Sputnik.
June 12. After coral reef, 1/6th of fish and marine life set to disappear from oceans, says study. International Business Times.
June 12. The drilldown: climate change could reduce sea life 17 per cent by 2100. iPolitics.
June 12. Rising temperatures could kill 17% of sea life by century’s end. 24/7 Wall St.
June 11. Oceans will lose one-sixth of marine life from current greenhouse gas emissions. The Hill.
June 11. Earth’s oceans could lose one-sixth of marine life by 2100 due to climate change. CBS News.
June 11. In hot water? Study says warming may reduce sea life by 17%. Victoria News.
June 11. In hot water? Study says warming may reduce sea life by 17%. Phys.org.
June 10. Local companies find pre-emptive ban on single-use plastics is good business, expert says. CityNews 1130.
June 7. UBC goes all in for sustainable seafood. UBC News.
May 29. Fisheries subsidies negotiations: what is at stake for least developed countries? Trade for Development News.
May 24. Study shows economic benefits of patient approach to northern cod recovery. CTV News.
May 24. Patience is the key to a resurrection of the cod-forsaken East Coast fishery, study says. Globe and Mail.
May 23. Northern cod fishery could provide 16x more jobs and 5x more economic value. Oceana.
May 22. Put fishing back in BC fishermen’s hands. The Tyee.
May 21. Solutions for the peopled sea–combining conservation and social justice. Sealives.
May 17. Your climate, your choice: Analyzing Federal Green Party’s climate plan. Global News.
May 9. How humanity put 1 million species at risk of extinction. CBC.
RESEARCHER IN PROFILE
Sondra Eger is a PhD candidate in her fourth year at the School of Environment, Resources and Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. She is a member of OceanCanada’s Atlantic Working Group and crosscutting Governance theme. She is currently co-leading a chapter on ‘bright spots’ in integrated management with Rob Stephenson (edited by Derek Armitage) for the forthcoming OceanCanada book highlighting member research. As a multitude of activities continue to have negative cumulative impacts on coastal and marine social-ecological systems, Sondra is committed to investigating how to move beyond conventional approaches to governing coastal and marine activities and to move towards the sustainable and just use of coastal and marine resources. In particular, she is motivated to advance collaborative, multi-actor governance with Indigenous and state authorities, coastal communities, industry and non-governmental actor groups and to connect local narratives to higher level policies and priorities, to improve the understanding and management of complex social and ecological marine systems.
Her doctoral research critically examines integrated management interventions at the international, regional and local scale. Using the empirical context of the Bay of Fundy, Sondra carried out data collection for her doctoral research as a Huntsman Marine Science Centre Visiting Research Fellow based in St. Andrews, New Brunswick, and with the collaboration of local organizations and institutions. Her work underscores the importance and need for better integrating knowledge and objectives across activities and governing authorities as well as highlights main challenges from study participants’ lived experiences. Through this work Sondra aims to offer key management, policy, and user-based recommendations to improve the operationalization of responsible integrated management interventions.
This past March, as a Flaherty Research Scholar with the Ireland Canada University Foundation, Sondra was hosted by Wesley Flannery and his research group at Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland, where she further developed a critical view of integrated governance and management interventions. While on the Emerald Isle, she also participated in an annual meeting of ICES Marine Spatial Planning and Coastal Zone Management Working Group at the Marine Institute in Galway. Recently, she co-led a ‘facilitating engagement’ workshop at the Canadian Water Resources Association Conference to emphasize the value of building relationships between different sectors and to provide practical tools for integrating objectives at the organizational and project level. This year Sondra also presented some of her findings within Stream 3: Governing, steering, and managing coasts and oceans at MARE: People and the Sea X Conference in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. She continues to assist in coordinating the Student Leadership Committee of the Canadian Rivers Institute to support interdisciplinary researchers and remains active in other networks and organizations (e.g., Bay of Fundy Ecosystem Partnership, University of Waterloo Graduate Student
Association, MarSocSci).
PUBLICATIONS
JOURNAL ARTICLES
Abbott JK, Sumaila UR. 2019. (Review of Environmental Economics and Policy) Reducing marine plastic pollution: policy insights from economics.
Ban NC, Gurney GG, Marshall NA, Whitney CK, Mills M, Gelcich S, Bennett NJ, Meehan MC, Butler C, Ban S, Tran TC, Cox ME, Breslow SJ. 2019.
(Nature Sustainability) Well-being outcomes of marine protected areas.
Ben-Hasan A, Walters C, Sumaila UR. 2019. (Frontiers in Marine Science)
Effects of management on the profitability of seasonal fisheries.
Brueckner-Irwin I, Armitage D, Courtenay S. 2019. (Ecology and Society) Applying a social-ecological well-being approach to enhance opportunities for marine protected area governance.
Laffoley D, Baxter J, Amon D, Currie D, Downs C, Hall-Spencer J, Harden-Davies H, Page R, Reid P, Roberts M, Rogers A, Thiele T, Sheppard C, Sumaila UR, Woodall L. 2019. (Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems) Eight urgent, fundamental and simultaneous steps needed to restore ocean health, and the consequences for humanity and the planet of inaction or delay.
Lotze HK, Tittensor DP, Bryndum-Buchholz A, Eddy TD, Cheung WWL, et al. 2019. (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) Global ensemble projections reveal trophic amplification of ocean biomass declines with climate change.
Milewski I, Smith RE. 2019. (Marine Policy) Sustainable aquaculture in Canada: lost in translation.
Palacios-Abrantes J, Cisneros-Montemayor AM, Cisneros-Mata MA, Rodríguez L, Arreguín-Sánchez F, Aguilar V, Domínguez-Sánchez S, Fulton S, López-Sagástegui R, Reyes-Bonilla H, Rivera-Campos R, Salas S, Simoes N, Cheung WWL, et al. 2019. (PLOS ONE) A metadata approach to evaluate the state of ocean knowledge: strengths, limitations, and application to Mexico.
Schuhbauer A, Cisneros-Montemayor AM, Chuenpagdee R, Sumaila UR. 2019. (Marine Ecology Progress Series) Assessing the economic viability of small-scale fisheries: an example from Mexico.
Singh GG, Hilmi N, Bernhardt JR, Cisneros-Montemayor AM, Cashion M,
Ota Y, Acar S, Brown JM, Cottrell R, Djoundourian S, González‐Espinosa PC, Lam V, Marshall N, Neumann B, Pascal N, Reygondeau G, Rocklӧv J, Safa A, Virto LR, Cheung WWL. 2019. (People and Nature) Climate impacts on the ocean are making the Sustainable Development Goals a moving target travelling away from us.
Tai TC, Steiner NS, Hoover C, Cheung WWL, Sumaila UR. 2019.
(Marine Policy) Evaluating present and future potential of Arctic fisheries in Canada.
RESEARCH REPORTS
Teh LSL, Cashion T, Alava Saltos JJ, Cheung WWL, Sumaila UR. 2019. (Fisheries Centre Research Reports) Status, trends, and the future of fisheries in the East and South China Seas.
Teh LSL, Sumaila UR. 2019. (Oceana Canada) Economic and social benefits of fisheries rebuilding: six Canadian case studies.
PRESENTATIONS
Accra, Ghana, August 18-21, 2019. Sumaila, Rashid.
Global trends in fisheries in the context of the blue economy: implications for Ghana. Keynote at Conference on Fisheries and Coastal Environment 2019.
Mauritius, July 1-6, 2019. Sumaila, Rashid.
Why Africa should be at the forefront of the fight to eliminate harmful subsidies at the WTO. WIOMSA 11th Scientific Symposium.
Amsterdam, The Netherlands, June 25-28, 2019. Bennett, Nathan; Brown, Katrina; Charles, Anthony; Courtenay, Simon; Eger, Sondra; Isaacs, Moenieba; Kurien, John; St. Martin, Kevin; Sumaila, Rashid; Willman, Rolf.
MARE X, People and the Sea
Critical and constructive engagements: political ecologies of the ocean and coastal environment. (Bennett)
Maritime and coastal communities. (Brown, Charles, St. Martin)
Operationalizing integrated coastal and marine management initiatives: insights from lived experiences in the Bay of Fundy, Atlantic Canada. (Eger, Courtenay)
Fisheries world-wide. (Isaacs, Kurien, Sumaila, Willman)
Barcelona, Spain, June 20, 2019. Sumaila, Rashid.
Ecosystem services at the core of a sustainable blue economy. Blue Economy in a Healthy Ocean, Government of Catalonia.
Brest, France, June 17-21, 2019. Armitage, Derek; Cheung, William; Engler, Cecilia; Koubrak, Olga; Kjesbu, Olav Sigurd; Nayak, Prateep; Palacios-Abrantes, Juliano; Saunders, Phillip; Teh, Louise; VanderZwaag, David.
IMBeR Open Science Conference
Session: Transboundary fisheries management in changing North Atlantic and Pacific oceans: taking stock, future scenarios
Matching the time of emergence of transboundary fish stocks to lead time for policy response under climate change. (Cheung)
The international law and policy seascape for managing shifting species and ecosystems. (Engler and Saunders)
Are transboundary fisheries management arrangements in the North Atlantic seaworthy in a changing ocean? (Koubrak and VanderZwaag)
Challenges to transboundary fisheries management in North America under climate change. (Palacios-Abrantes)
40 years of Norwegian experience in management of transboundary fish stocks: lessons learned and how will climate change interact. (Kjesbu)
Session: Designing the quilt of sustainable ocean governance
Towards a quilt of sustainable ocean governance: piecing in the precautionary approach. (VanderZwaag)
Governing the ocean and coastal commons. (Armitage)
Session: Ecosystem-social interactions in marginal areas
Taking stock: status and trends in East China Sea fisheries. (Teh)
Session: Ocean governance in the face of change: confronting the challenge of rebuilding fish stocks, fisheries and viable coastal communities and preparing for future change
Keynote: Knowledge co-production and the governance of our future oceans and coasts. (Armitage)
Economic and social benefits of fisheries rebuilding: six Canadian case studies. (Teh)
A three-dimensional perspective on creating viable fishing communities amidst a changing ocean. (Nayak)
Session: Modelling social ecological systems: methods and tools for scenario development and prediction
Using integrated scenarios and models to explore trade-offs in future seafood sustainability under global change. (Cheung)
Oslo, Norway, June 14, 2019 (3-4 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why Norway should be at the forefront of the push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Norwegian Government.
Oslo, Norway, June 14, 2019 (12:30-2 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why Chile’s laudable ocean conservation effort should take on subsidies disciplines. Chilean Ambassador to Norway and other ambassadors.
Berlin, Germany, June 13, 2019. Sumaila, Rashid.
Why Germany should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. WWF Germany.
Brussels, Belgium, June 12, 2019 (3-5 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why Africa, Caribbean, Pacific (ACP) countries should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. ACP Secretariat.
Brussels, Belgium, June 12, 2019 (10 am-12 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why Europe should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. Public Briefing.
Copenhagen, Denmark, June 12, 2019. Newell, Sarah.
Indigenous perspectives on how climate change impacts governance and co-management of resources in Chesterfield Inlet, Nunavut. III TRAMEREN International Conference on Arctic Environmental and Climate Change Governance.
Geneva, Switzerland, June 11, 2019 (6-8 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Closing reception comments, WTO trade negotiators, WTO Secretariat staff.
Geneva, Switzerland, June 11, 2019 (5-6 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why WTO negotiators should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. Australia, Latin 6, New Zealand and Brazil Delegates.
Geneva, Switzerland, June 11, 2019 (4-5 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why India should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. India Delegates.
Geneva, Switzerland, June 11, 2019 (3-4 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why the Africa, Caribbean, Pacific Group (ACP) should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. ACP Geneva Delegates.
Geneva, Switzerland, June 11, 2019 (1-3 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why WTO negotiators should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. 100 WTO Trade Negotiators/Delegates, and non-profit representatives.
Geneva, Switzerland, June 11, 2019 (11:30 am-12:45 pm). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why Least Developed Countries (LDC) should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. WTO Trade Negotators, LDC Group.
Geneva, Switzerland, June 11, 2019 (10:30-11:30 am). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why WTO negotiators should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies.
Geneva, Switzerland, June 11, 2019 (8-10 am). Sumaila, Rashid.
Why ambassadors should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. Ambassadors’ Breakfast.
London, UK, June 10, 2019. Sumaila, Rashid.
Why the UK should push for a WTO agreement on harmful subsidies. UK Government and Commonwealth Secretariat.
Roatán, Honduras, June 6-7, 2019. Herrera, Claudia; Vanderbeck, Isabelle; Sumaila, Rashid.
Innovative solutions for integrated management and sustainable use of marine resources. Green Solutions for a Blue Planet, Blue Economy Summit.
London, UK, June 5, 2019. Sumaila, Rashid.
A question of economics. A Global Agreement for the High Seas, Blue Marine Foundation.
High seas management: a regional, global or hybrid approach? Breakout group, A Global Agreement for the High Seas, Blue Marine Foundation.
Vancouver, BC, June 1-7, 2019. Bennett, Nathan.
How do perceptions relate to support for conservation? Perceptions of small-scale fishermen in marine protected areas in the Mediterranean Sea. Environmental Studies Association of Canada.