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About Us

 

Welcome to the SustainFish research project. Its purpose is to investigate sustainability in the aquaculture industry, with particular focus on implementation of certification schemes and indicators of sustainability.

The SustainFish Project

- From global ideals to local realities, the foundations of sustainability

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SustainFish was funded by the Norwegian Research Council (Havbruk2 program) and included researchers from Norway, Chile and Scotland.

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The project period was 1st of June 2016 to 31st of May 2019. 

The aquaculture industry is subject to regulations, standards and indicators generated at a variety of management levels: international, national and industry. SustainFish will map and study the existent standards and indicators available for defining sustainable production in aquaculture on a global, national and industry level, and create insight into how the industry is applying these. 


In this project, the already existent sustainability standards and indicators were mapped to gain knowledge of the frictions and fits between existent standards, and the needs of the industry and society at large. In addition, we studied how these standards are implemented on a company level in three countries: Norway, Chile and Scotland. The results were combined in an integrated, international comparative analysis, and the projects results identified gaps that need to be addressed, and improvement possibilities for developing sustainability indicators. 
 

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Project Members

Dr. Tonje Osmundsen

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The project manager is the Research Director of NTNU Social Research, Studio Apertura, and has extensive experience from research on the aquaculture industry. She has managed several projects financed by the Research Council of Norway, Regional Research Fund and private industry the past 15 years, including both national and international research partners. She is also a project manager for the STARR and SARA project financed by the Havbruk program. She holds a PhD in political science and has worked in organizational research the past 20 years.

 

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Prof. Jennifer Bailey

 

She is from NTNU, Dep. of Soc. & Pol. Sc., and has in-depth knowledge of management and civil society issues with respect to aquaculture, fisheries and the marine dimensions of climate change. Deeply involved in interdisciplinary projects, Dr. Bailey has led two NFR projects, including the CINTERA project which focused on eutrophication and aquaculture in Norway and Chile, and was a WP leader in the recently completed EU 7th Framework Programme-funded project Ocean Certain. She is a Senior Researcher with the Earth Systems Governance Project and of the ICES Working Group on Marine Systems.

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Dr. Bengt Finstad

 

From the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA), he has 25 years’ experience within fish physiology, salmon ecology and studies on lice effects on salmonid species,
widely knowledge into aquaculture related issues, and has co-ordinated many nationally and internationally funded projects in this field. Dr. Finstad has published more than 100 peer-reviewed publications and has extensive experience in supervising Masters and PhD students. 

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Prof. Frank Asche

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Frank Asche is a professor at the University of Florida, president of the International Association of Aquaculture Economics and Management and associate editor for Marine Resource Economics. He has been a visiting scholar at the University of British Columbia, the University of Rhode Island and Duke University. His research interests focus on aquaculture and seafood markets, but he has also been doing work in fisheries management and energy economics. Professor Asche has published numerous articles in international journals in economics as well as leading multi-disciplinary journals like Science and PNAS.He has also undertaken a number of research projects in Norway as well as for international organizations like the FAO, OECD and WTO.

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Dr. Hugo Salgado-Cabrera

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From Universidad de Talca/Interdisciplinary Center for Aquaculture Research (INCAR), he obtained his doctoral degree PhD in Agricultural and Resource Economics from the University of California at Berkeley in 2008. His research interests focus on fisheries and aquaculture economics and in the regulation of environmental and natural resources. He also maintains close collaboration with the School of Political Science and Sociology at NTNU, participating in research projects related to the incorporation of stakeholder perceptions, knowledge and opinion to achieve sustainable Fisheries and Aquaculture activities around the globe.

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Ass. Prof. Klaudia Hernandez

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Dr. Hernandez is a Marine Biologist with postgraduate experience in coastal oceanography with main interests in environmental changes on aquatic communities. She formerly worked at Universidad Austral and Andres Bello from Chile, and is a researcher consultant in NGO-MARINA. Her  research interests are focused to understand microbial responses to environmental changes  (physicochemical, anthropogenic, among others) in aquatic systems in order to promote better practices towards environmental sustainability.

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Dr. Karen Alexander

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Formerly at Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS), Karen is currently based at the University of Tasmania in Australia. She is a human geographer with multi-disciplinary interests, centering on marine environmental governance and including spatial planning, coupled human-environment systems, the ways in which environmental knowledge is produced and used, and marine policy. Most recently, Dr. Alexander’s research has focused upon aquaculture - working with stakeholders to identify opportunities and constraints relating to spatial aspects of marine industry development; and investigating the ways in which policy and legislation can affect innovation in the transition to a green (blue) economy.

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Vilde Steiro Amundsen

 

Amundsen is obtaining her PhD in political science through the SustainFish project, working at NTNU Social Research, Studio Apertura. She has a master's degree from NTNU in social anthropology. Her previous experience with the aquaculture industry is from a six-month long fieldwork in an aquaculture company in Chile in 2014. Before starting her PhD, Amundsen had an internship at a cross-cultural consultancy company in Finland. 

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Marit Schei Olsen

 

Olsen is a researcher at NTNU Social Research, Studio Apertura, where she has worked with topics often related to public regulation and policy implementation. Since 2014 she has been a PhD scholar in the STARR project (Sustainable aquaculture – regulation and reputation) financed by the HAVBRUK program from the Research Council of Norway. In her PhD she is studying the Norwegian aquaculture industry and processes where actors and stakeholders seek power to influence the perception and regulatory framework of the industry.

 

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