The OA CoP at The Oceans in a High-CO2 World Symposium
The OA CoP recently participated in The Ocean in a High-CO2 World Symposium in Wellington, New Zealand, and we were delighted to connect with both our Canadian community and international collaborators. Each day we set our intentions and were grounded by reciting a karakia in Māori written for the symposium. This version of the conference was still rooted in OA, but included an expanded focus on other multistressors, such as deoxygenation, mCDR, and science-to-action.
There were many excellent talks and posters given by our Canadian OA CoP members, and the OA CoP leadership participated in several workshops, sessions, meetings, and side events. Dr. Helen Gurney-Smith gave an insightful presentation on using science to inform policy at the Marine Policy Engagement 101 session for early career researchers, hosted by ICONEC and the OA Alliance, where she and Dr. Kristina Barclay also served as mentors for break-out sessions. Dr. Gurney-Smith was also an expert panelist for the Exploring the OA-mCDR Connection workshop for OA practitioners, and helped to lead a GOA-ON workshop. Drs. Gurney-Smith and Barclay also chaired a session on multistressors impacts on North American species with Canadian, Mexican and US early career and senior presenters, and hosted a meeting to discuss the development of a North American OA synthesis with members of the GOA-ON North American Hub. We were delighted to see so much interest in the development of the synthesis and representation from all three countries. If you are interested to learn more, please email northamericanhub@goa-on.org.
Left: Breakfast meeting to discuss a North American OA Synthesis with representatives from Mexico, Canada, and the US. Right: Chairs and Speakers from the OA multistressor effects on North American species session.
Other events included a screening of the short film Changing Waters: Time for action on ocean acidification by our partners at the OA Alliance, many excellent keynote speakers, and pre-symposium meetings, such as the GOA-ON Executive Council meeting. The symposium was extremely well executed, and there were many fruitful conversations and meetings. Emerging themes from the meeting included the growing importance of translating OA science into decision-making at all levels, the critical role of OA expertise in evaluating mCDR strategies, the progress made in understanding OA, and the next challenge of scaling up and integrating observations, biology, and modelling to understand ecosystem and system-wide impacts of OA as part of broader global and regional climate change.
Dr. Helen Gurney-Smith speaking as a panelist for the OA-mCDR connection workshop (top) and speaker for the Marine Policy Engagement workshop (bottom).
The OA CoP is grateful for the support of both GOA-ON and the OA Alliance for supporting the travel of Dr. Barclay and Dr. Gurney-Smith, respectively. We look forward to continuing the conversations and planned work discussed at the symposium. We are also grateful for the time to connect with our Canadian OA CoP members and international collaborators. This meeting happens once every 4 years (next location to be decided), but do keep it on your radar as a place where you might lead a session, submit a presentation or be part of the discussion. Hopefully see you all at the next symposium!
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