Sustaining Food from the Seas
with Professor Ray Hilborn, School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences
Tuesday, April 11, 2017 | 7-8 p.m.
Kane Hall, Room 130
FREE and open to the public
No rsvp required
Reception to follow
About Ray Hilborn
Ray Hilborn has been a professor in the University of Washington’s School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences for 30 years. Over his career, he has studied the global status of marine fisheries, the impact of bottom trawling on the sea floor, and the impact of harvesting “forage fish” on their predators. Professor Hilborn also coordinates teams of faculty and student researchers studying salmon at UW research posts in Bristol Bay, Alaska.
He has co-authored more than 300 scientific papers as well as several books, including “Overfishing: What Everyone Needs to Know,” “Quantitative Fisheries Stock Assessment” and “The Ecological Detective: Confronting Models with Data.”
Professor Hilborn has received the Volvo Environment Prize, the International Fisheries Science Prize, the Ecological Society of America’s Sustainability Science Award, and the American Fisheries Society’s Award of Excellence. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, and a member of both the Washington State Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
About this lecture
The world’s oceans provide an important source of nutrition for more than one billion people, and employment for hundreds of millions. But is this sustainable? And if so, where? And how?
Over the last decade, a series of international collaborations have evaluated the impact of fishing around the world, and the results are contrary to popular perception: The abundance of fish in the oceans appears to be stable overall — not decreasing — and fish numbers are increasing in countries that are willing to reduce fishing pressure when necessary. This talk will explore why some fisheries are prospering and some are not, and will examine the environmental impact of harvesting food from the seas compared to other food sources.
About the University Faculty Lecture
Since 1976, the University Faculty Lecture has honored faculty whose research, scholarship or art have left a lasting mark on their profession and beyond. In conjunction with the Office of the Provost, UW faculty members choose one of their peers to deliver this annual lecture. Professor Ray Hilborn joins a roster of Nobel laureates, historians, artists, scientists and authors who have given this lecture over its long history.
