This week, OAP convened a Regional Ocean Acidification Vulnerability and Resilience Assessment Workshop for current and for potential applicants to the open regional vulnerability assessment (RVA) funding call. The workshop aimed to provide a forum for social scientists and natural scientists to come together and both share their experience and build future collaborations. This workshop highlighted regional efforts on how ocean acidification fits into community risk and vulnerability and ways to build resilience.
Attendees heard about successes and lessons learned from recent RVA assessment projects. With a focus on community engagement, take home messages included a need for longer term timelines to allow for essential relationship building and continued engagement that was deemed critical to success. Participants then engaged in topical discussions for working in data-poor regions, engaging Indigenous communities, how to build interdisciplinary teams, and frameworks for assessing vulnerability.
Speakers included:
Emily Rivest, Virginia Institute of Marine Science: Vulnerability of oyster aquaculture and restoration to ocean acidification and other co-stressors in the Chesapeake Bay
Samantha Siedlecki, University of Connecticut: Assessing vulnerability of the Atlantic Sea Scallop social-ecological system in the northeast waters of the U.S.
Ana Spalding, Oregon State University: Assessing Community Vulnerability to Ocean Acidification Across the California Current Ecosystem
Kirsten Oleson, University of Hawai’i Manoa: Assessing Current and Future Ocean Acidification and Climate Vulnerabilities Along the Hawaiian Archipelago
Image: Fishing vessels from the Fishermen’s Dock Cooperative ply the waters of the New York Bight for fluke, hake, squid, and scallops. Fishing communities among others face risks of changing ocean conditions and impacts to fisheries. Credit: Mid-Atlantic Regional Council on the Ocean
