Fish-WIKS News

Following the valuable exposure of Fish-WIKS research findings to a large group of inter-disciplinary social scientists last year at the 12th International Conference on Interdisciplinary Social Sciences in Hiroshima, Japan, Fish-WIKS PI Dr. Lucia Fanning attended this year's conference in Granada, Spain, July 25-27, to share additional Fish-WIKS results.

With a focus in the session on Community Involvement in environmental decision-making, Dr. Fanning shared the findings from research conducted by former Fish-WIKS Master's student Erin Keenan on the role of the community of Naujaat in narwhal management in Nunavut. (A pdf of Erin's presentation of her findings can be found here [PDF - 960kB].)

Participants from as far away as South Africa and Vietnam attended the session and expressed considerable interest in the lessons to be learned from empowering communities to participate in natural resource decisions affecting their livelihoods. An extended discussion period followed Dr. Fanning's presentation in which participants were eager to learn and share efforts to build meaningful relationships between communities and governmental decision makers.

Fish-WIKS PI Lucia Fanning (centre) takes part in conference discussion