Meeting Information
2023 Western Division & ICAFS Annual Meeting
Managing Aquatic Ecosystems and Shifting Baselines: Challenges and Opportunities
Join us May 8-11, 2023 Boise Center on the Grove, Boise, ID
Nearly one-quarter into the 21st century, fisheries professionals are challenged as never before by a changing climate. In terms of managing aquatic ecosystems, Dr. Daniel Pauly coined the term "shifting baselines" to refer to the loss of perception of ecological change from one generation to the next, but for the purposes of this meeting, we use the term to refer to unrelenting transformation of the earth's climate that will likely continue for many decades and that will clearly require seismic shifts in how we manage and conserve aquatic ecosystems. A new thought process is emerging to address fisheries and wildlife management and conservation in the face of such dramatic climate change: Resist-Accept-Direct (RAD). Resist represents the traditional practice of implementing actions to counteract changes and restore ecosystems to prior conditions. Accept is when decisions are made to allow ecological conditions to change without implementing restoration actions, perhaps to divert energy away from "lost causes" and focus efforts where positive outcomes are more achievable. Direct is attempting to forecast future conditions and implement actions that attempt to steer ecosystem changes so that some sort of ecological function persists, though the former ecosystem may not. Three plenary speakers and other invited speakers will provide a forum to explore RAD and other resource management frameworks from various avenues of research, management, and conservation.