Thu, February 18, 2021 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM See description. The traditional approach to conservation science is to observe and model the impacts of threats (logging, mining, fishing, climate change for example) on species and their habitats, publish a paper of the findings in a peer-reviewed journal, and hope that policymakers will take action.
Tara Martin believes this approach is not enough, and that scientists must go further to offer practical solutions and blueprints for conservation action. With hundreds of species at risk and limited amounts of time and money, policymakers need expert guidance on how to use resources most effectively and invest where the likelihood of success is greatest.
Since 2018 Tara’s research has been transforming the way conservation research happens in British Columbia and beyond. Using a tool called Priority Threat Management, Tara and her team have combined robust empirical data with expert knowledge to offer prospectuses for conservation in BC, Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, Australia, Indonesia and Antarctica.
In this webinar, Tara will use her recent work on the Fraser River Estuary as an example of this innovative approach. With 102 species at risk in the estuary, Tara and her colleagues have studied the impacts of current and future development projects and created a clear action plan – with price tags – for conserving every one of them.
Take part in this presentation from the UBC Faculty of Forestry’s Professor Tara Martin, followed by a Q&A moderated by UBC’s President & Vice-Chancellor, Professor Santa J. Ono. By the end of this webinar you will have a better understanding of how to frame conservation problems as well as the research and decision-making processes used to successfully solve them.
About the Speaker
Tara Martin
Dr. Tara Martin is the Liber Ero UBC Chair in Conservation and a Professor in Conservation Decision Science in the Department of Forest and Conservation Sciences. She leads the Martin Conservation Decisions Lab in the Faculty of Forestry, where she supervises 12 graduate students and works with a wide range of collaborators and supporters.
Tara is a member of the International Union for Conservation of Nature Climate Change Specialist Group and co-leads the Climate Adaptation Theme. She holds a PhD in Ecology from the University of Queensland, Australia.