Faculty Research Fellow Catherine West Presents at Oceans Past International Conference in Germany

Catherine West, a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Archaeology and a Faculty Research Fellow at the Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future, recently presented her research on the resilience and sustainability of Pacific cod at the Oceans Past International Conference in Bremerhaven, Germany.

The focus of the conference was on tracing the history of human interactions with life in the ocean – sometimes over centuries or millennia – and the implications of those interactions for better informed policy and management. Prof. West’s research group presented a number of papers, including her own paper in collaboration with both American and Russian fisheries managers titled “Long-term stock assessment of Pacific cod in the North Pacific Ocean.”

As a Pardee Center Faculty Research Fellow, Prof. West is convening a group of social scientists, resource managers, and climate scientists for the first Symposium on Circumpolar Climate Change, Resource Management, and Applied Archaeology. The objective of the symposium is to create real discussion about the value of long-term archaeological and paleoenvironmental records for contemporary resource management. In particular, the symposium will build on existing collaborations to discuss the role of these long-term records in fisheries management in the North Pacific and North Atlantic Oceans, where fishing is central to cultural and economic health.