Classes

This class covers introductory topics in marine coastal conservation initiatives, including topics in fisheries biology and the history of aquaculture, conservation biology, and biodiversity. The first two weeks of this four-week course will tentatively take place at the USC Wrigley Marine Science Center and contain lectures focused on coastal ecosystem management and conservation, lab work and daily field-work assignments. Lecture topics will cover the historical development of aquaculture, case studies of current practices and various approaches to sustainable management across the globe.

The course will continue for the following two weeks taught in Taipei, National Taiwan University (NTU), and will include lectures encompassing urban ecology, conservation biology and biodiversity intermingled with a field component. Through trips to intertidal zones and subtropical forests such as the Lienhuachi Experimental Forest will facilitate in-situ exploration of these topics.

Global population is on a trajectory to approach 10 billion by the year 2050, intensifying the need for sustainable approaches to food production and food security. Aquatic systems, including oceans represent more than 99% of the biosphere and offer vast potential for offsetting sustainability challenges and limitations inherent in terrestrial agriculture and livestock production. Seafood from marine and freshwaters offer a valuable nutritional source; however, yield from wild-capture fisheries have attained a maximum.

In this course we explore the potential and problems of aquaculture, the production of fish, invertebrate and plants from marine and freshwater aquatic systems, to advance sustainable food production and security. We will address the potential for aquaculture to contribute the environmentally sustainable food production and highlight salient challenges for aquaculture from the perspective of science, technology, economics and policy.

In this class, the trainees will work at the facilities of our collaborators from industry to gain a hands-on experience of currently active practices.

Here is an example of R&D that trainees may face:

Methane is the second major contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions world-wide, with the agriculture industry accounting for approximately 25% of total atmospheric methane (Machado et al. 2014). California has remained on the forefront of tackling this issue by requiring farmers to reduce methane emissions 40% by 2030 from 2013 levels. Bromoform, a bioactive compound found in the alga Asparagopsis taxiformis, is known to efficiently suppress CH4 production when fed to ruminants. In collaboration with UC Davis, USC participated in in vivo trials in which a Catalina Island strain of A. taxiformis reduced CH4 nearly 50% (Brook et al. 2018). With approximately two million head of cattle in California, the major limiting factor preventing the ubiquitous use of A. taxiformis is supply (Neethy et al. 2017). Cattle eat, on average, 24Lbs of dry-weight feed per day thus creating a market for nearly 250K kg per day in California. At a cost of $0.5 per pound that farmers can absorb, this creates an annual market worth of close to $50M a year. In collaboration with Carlsbad Aquafarms, USC has set propagation of red algae on-land, required for large-scale trials for quantifying the desirable and potential adverse side effects on cows.

Although the above R&D is an example of an active project, we have other pending and planned research activities with our partners that have great potential for training in this class component.

This new session is mainly comprised of practical work. However, the training will also intermingle design, policy and economy components with practical R&D offered in the form of lectures and opportunities to work directly with industry and academic collaborators. The exact topics will vary depending on availability of active project, but here is an example:

The potential of monetizing aquaculture benefits and policy approaches. Marine ecosystems face increasing pressure to provide food, energy, and other natural resources for a growing global population. Although on the surface oceans may appear empty, in reality, every hectare of water column is contested by advocates representing often incompatible uses such as recreation, tourism, shipping, military defense,ecological conservation, spiritual practice, mining, and commercial and recreational harvest of animals and algae (Lester et al., 2018). Marine spatial planning (MSP) refers to formal governance processes in which stakeholders from governmental, business, and civil society organizations seek to establish policies for partitioning marine and coastal resources (Zaucha and Gee, 2019). Together with the instructor, the trainees will conduct a systematic review of empirical studies of MSP processes that identify keys to successful stakeholder engagement. Through content analysis of the reviewed studies, including descriptive, graphical, and inferential statistical analysis of the coding data, they will identify factors conducive to marine spatial planning.

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