Between September 4 and 8, 2017, the 4th International Marine Protected Areas Congress, IMPAC 4, was hosted in Chile. The purpose of IMPAC 4 was to integrate and connect relevant actors across the oceans for MPA development.
Asia is a powerhouse in both the production and consumption of seafood. Asia is home to 84% of the world’s fishers and fish farmers, and over 70% of the world’s fish and fishery products are consumed here. Yet demand within Asia for certified seafood lags behind rates in other regions, such as Europe and North America. This suggests an unevenly developed certification landscape, but one with vast potential if it can gain popularity in Asia.
By Guillermo Ortuño Crespo, Nereus Program Fellow at Duke University
Due to their wide-ranging swimming behaviors, migratory fish, marine mammal, seabird and sea turtle species experience a variety, and an increasing amount, of anthropogenic pressures over the course of their lives. These threats, including climate change, overfishing, and marine pollution, combined with conservation strategies that largely fail to consider spatial connectivity over the life cycle, are resulting in declining populations worldwide.
Reducing tourist consumption of reef fish is critical for Palau’s ocean sustainability, finds a new Nippon Foundation-UBC Nereus Program study published today in Marine Policy.
While climate change is expected to lead to sharp declines in Palau’s reefs, the best tourism management strategy includes a more than 70 per cent reduction in reef fish consumption by visitors. These findings are highly relevant for sustainable development in small island developing states under climate change.
Nereus Director of Science William Cheung has won the Prix d’ Excellence Award by the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES). The Prix d’Excellence is awarded every three years for a high level of achievement in marine sciences work through research, scientific leadership and scientific policy leadership.
The Western & Central Pacific Fisheries Commission (WCPFC) held an Intercessional Meeting, from August 22 to 24 2017 in Honolulu, Hawaii, for negotiations for the conservation and management of highly migratory fish stocks. Nereus Principal Investigator Quentin Hanich (University of Wollongong) was in attendance with new Nereus Fellow Katy Seto, who joined the Nereus network in September 2017 after completing her doctoral degree at University of California at Berkeley.
By Colin Thackray, Nereus Fellow at Harvard University
It’s fairly common knowledge that tuna is high in methylmercury, a neurotoxin that bioaccumulates in marine food webs. This means that methylmercury magnifies further up the food web – tuna eat smaller fish that eat even smaller fish or plankton — all of which could contain the contaminant.
Nereus Alumnus Natasha Henschke (Princeton University) is currently at sea on the RV Investigator, sailing off the East Australian coast. She is working as the deputy chief scientist, helping to collect data that will allow, for the first time, the relationship between open ocean production and coastal fisheries off south eastern Australia to be established. The voyage will be used to study the Tasman Sea ecosystem and examine the link between plankton and fisheries in the region.
As part of the 2016 International Marine Conservation Congress, in St John’s, Newfoundland, new Nereus Fellow at Stanford Julia Mason shared her story about beginning her career in science and the realizations she had. She discusses the disconnect between fisheries science and the management of the fisheries on the ground and the importance of building relationships.
Climate change and human activity have pressing impacts on the state of our ocean, threatening the integrity of marine ecosystems themselves as well as the services they provide to human communities. Given the inevitable current and future effects of climate change, adaptation by both physical and human systems is crucial.