Marine Policy Publication

Assessing the added value of the recent declaration on unregulated fishing for sustainable governance of the central Arctic Ocean.

Link to the article in Marine Policy.

References

Shephard, G.E., Dalen, K., Peldszus, R., Aparício, S., Beumer, L., Birkeland, R., Gkikas, N., Kourantidou, M., Ktenas, P., Linde, P.W., Marazzi, F., Pincinato, R.B.M., Radianti, J., Schartmüller, B., Stübner, E.I., Varnajot, A., Vullierme, M., Zhilina, I., 2016. Assessing the added value of the recent declaration on unregulated fishing for sustainable governance of the central Arctic Ocean. Marine Policy v.66 p.50- 57 doi:10.1016/j.marpol.2016.01.013

Introduction

In August 2015, NVP co-organised an international summer school held in Longyearbyen, Svalbard. The week-long workshop brought together a group of 18 international early career researchers and expert lecturers from a wide range of Arctic-related topics. Under the umbrella theme of governance, part of the group’s work was to discuss the recent ‘Declaration concerning the prevention of unregulated high seas fishing in the central Arctic Ocean’ signed by the A5 nations in Oslo in July 2015.

Whilst it is not legally binding, the timing and nature of its signing as well as the contents and wording hold implications for a variety of stakeholders, not limited to the Declaration’s signatories. Furthermore, the potential social, economic and political impacts of the Declaration are underpinned by the Arctic’s unique climatic and ecologic dynamics, which are poorly understood. By amalgamating the wide spectrum of early career attendees’ backgrounds, including political science, diplomacy, economics, energy, biology, computing, remote sensing and marine geoscience, this paper was an exciting culmination of the group’s activities and will be published in the journal Marine Policy this year.