A University of Bath Institute for Policy Research (IPR) lecture. Part of the ongoing public event series, ‘Our oceans: A deep dive’.
ABOUT THIS EVENT
Fishing and aquaculture are threatened by ocean warming, ocean acidification, and deoxygenation that are the result of human kind’s emission of Green House Gases. This industry sector is also a contributor to GHG emissions, and its depletion of biomass has a significant effect on the ocean’s own biological carbon pump.
Because of our rapidly changing global ocean, risk exposures will require safeguarding critical infrastructure and communities in order to maintain long-term supply chain resilience. This industry sector must act now to assess its vulnerabilities, and in turn, prepare plans to adapt to sea level rise, stronger storms, harmful algal blooms, loss of sea ice, and shifts in species migration patterns, as well as ocean chemistry changes including oxygen levels and acidification. The seafood industry must anticipate responses to climate change mitigation activities as well.
As it adapts to these threats to the industry’s core business, how will the seafood sector interact with ocean-based renewable energy production intended to help economies move away from fossil fuels?
Likewise, how will the seafood industry interact with restoration and conservation projects that take up and store carbon, which also strengthen resilience to climate change impacts through natural coastal ecosystem defenses?
And, if regulators seek to protect the ocean’s biological carbon pump, what role is there for this industry sector in protecting and restoring the ocean’s carbon cycle? How will the different forms of geo-engineering to technofix climate change affect the seafood sector? And, how will companies in this sector have to change their own practices to contribute to net-zero by 2050?
Speaker biography
Mark Spalding is an expert on international environmental policy and law, ocean policy and law, and coastal and marine philanthropy. He is President of The Ocean Foundation, and member of the Ocean Studies Board; the US National Committee for the Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development; and the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (USA). He is also serving on the Sargasso Sea Commission.
Mark is also a Senior Fellow at the Centre for the Blue Economy at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies; and an Advisor to the High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy.
In addition, he serves as the Advisor to the Rockefeller Climate Solutions Fund and the Credit Suisse Rockefeller Ocean Engagement Fund. He is also a member of the Pool of Experts for the UN World Ocean Assessment; and designed the first-ever blue carbon offset program, SeaGrass Grow.
This event is part of ‘Our oceans: A deep dive‘ – a new public event series seeking to explore the world’s oceans and what climate change, maritime trade and strategic conflict mean for their future.