Meeting Environmental and Natural Resource Challenges through Systems Research and Decision Support Models

这项研究将有助于应对社会面临的一个关键挑战：通过自然资源的利用，以及我们的环境和生态系统的健康，找到经济发展的正确平衡。重点放在加拿大全国和全球的海洋、海岸和渔业上，其动机是应对沿海和海洋上迅速增加的发展压力的普遍需要。更好、更全面的方法有助于应对挑战--评估和预测人类利用自然资源的可持续性，以及相应生态系统和人类系统的复原力，从而制定有效的管理计划。为此，我的研究将利用跨学科分析、指标框架、动态模型和决策支持方法，审查海洋/沿海资源产业与环境保护之间的相互作用，以及资源管理的有效性。最终，我希望为改善可持续发展以及管理和养护渔业、海岸和海洋地区贡献知识。具体而言，我将讨论两个关键主题领域： 1.支持管理渔业、沿海和海洋系统。我将致力于增进我们对海洋环境和资源挑战背后的结构和动态的了解，从而为渔业、海洋和沿海管理以及应对海洋灾害和气候变化方面的决策提供更好的支持。具体地说，我的目标是促进地方一级(和基于社区的)沿海管理的理论和实践，纳入当地沿海系统，包括工业部门和社区的结构、动态和不确定性，并解决这些系统中的风险和复原力问题。 2.渔业与保护区的相互作用和气候变化。我将通过分析渔业如何与两大力量相互作用来为渔业和养护决策提供支持--(I)气候变化对海洋系统的影响越来越大，(Ii)实施海洋保护区的广泛趋势，并限制人类使用。这项工作将使用综合模型来支持决策者应对MPA的实施和基于渔业的气候适应。 我的工作的预期意义将通过生产广泛使用的工具来实现，这些工具将(1)使资源行业和社会能够更好地评估环境和可持续影响，(2)使政府机构能够提高环境和自然资源管理的效率，以及资源系统的长期绩效。这些工具和方法将有助于制定和评估渔业、海洋和沿海系统的可持续发展战略，以满足加拿大和全球的两项迫切需要。首先，我将为三个主要的全球倡议提供指导：渔业的生态系统方法、海洋保护区和海洋空间规划。第二，我在地方沿海/海洋管理方面的工作将有助于解决处理地方问题的需要与通常收集和分析信息的更大规模之间的不匹配问题。 对于所有这些研究，我将继续与渔业部门、其他海洋利用部门、原住民和沿海社区以及各国政府和国际机构密切合作。最后，我的跨学科方法将增强研究的影响，这对这项研究的培训部分也很重要--培养学生和博士后研究员使用跨学科方法应对关键的环境和可持续发展挑战的能力。

This research will help meet a key challenge facing society: finding the right balance of economic development, through natural resource use, and the health of our environment and ecosystems. The focus is on oceans, coasts and fisheries, across Canada and globally, motivated by the widespread need to deal with rapidly increasing development pressures on coasts and oceans. Better, more holistic methods can help in meeting the challenge – to assess and predict sustainability of human uses of natural resources, and resilience of the corresponding ecosystems and human systems, leading to effective management plans. To this end, my research will examine interactions between marine/coastal resource industries and environmental conservation, and the effectiveness of resource management, through use of interdisciplinary analyses, indicator frameworks, dynamic models and decision support approaches. Ultimately, I hope to contribute knowledge for improved sustainable development, and for management and conservation of fisheries, coasts and ocean areas. Specifically I will address two key topic areas: 1. Support for Managing Fishery, Coastal and Marine Systems. I will aim to add to our understanding of the structure and dynamics underlying marine environmental and resource challenges, and thus provide improved support for decisions to be made in fishery, ocean and coastal management, and in responding to marine disasters and climate change. Specifically, I aim to contribute to the theory and practice of local-level (and community-based) coastal management, incorporating the structure, dynamics and uncertainties of local coastal systems, including industry sectors and communities, and addressing both risk and resilience in these systems. 2. Fishery Interactions with Protected Areas and Climate Change. I will seek to provide support for fishery and conservation decision-making through analyses of how fisheries interact with two major forces – (i) the increasing effects of climate change in marine systems, and (ii) the wide-ranging trend to implement marine protected areas (MPAs), with restrictions on human uses. This work will use integrated models to support decision-makers cope with MPA implementation and fishery-based climate adaptation. The anticipated significance of my work will arise through production of widely-utilized tools that will (1) enable resource industries, and society, to better evaluate environmental and sustainability impacts, and (2) enable government agencies to improve the efficiency of environmental and natural resource management, and the long-term performance of resource systems. These tools and methods will help in formulating and assessing sustainable development strategies in fisheries, ocean and coastal systems, addressing two urgent needs, in Canada and globally. First, I will provide guidance for 3 major global initiatives: the ecosystem approach to fisheries, marine protected areas, and marine spatial planning. Second, my work on local coastal/ocean management will contribute to resolving the mis-match between the need to deal with local issues and the larger scale at which information is usually collected and analysed. For all this research, I will continue to work closely with the fishing sector, other ocean use sectors, First Nations and coastal communities, as well as governments and international bodies. Finally, the impact of the research will be enhanced by my interdisciplinary approach, which is also important to the training component of this research – building the capacity of students and postdoctoral fellows to use interdisciplinary methods in addressing key environmental and sustainable development challenges.