Amanda C.J. Vincent, Ph.D.

Research

Amanda Vincent is a professor at the University of British Columbia and the director of Project Seahorse. She is a Canadian marine biologist and conservationist, and one of the world’s leading experts on seahorses and their relatives. With her Pew fellowship, Vincent focused on understanding and managing nonfood fisheries, with specific focus on seahorses and their relatives. She and her team published assessments of trades in marine animals for use in aquarium display, traditional medicines, curiosities, leather, research and teaching subjects, and bioprospecting. Vincent’s team then focused on a rapid assessment of seahorses in the central Philippines, where they are extracted for the first three uses. Filipino fishers and biologists were able to gather information on seahorse populations, habitats, catches, gear use, effort required, and the history of fishing grounds. As a result, her Pew fellowship produced a major milestone: the first global trade regulations for marine fishes of economic importance. Many wild seahorse populations have been in severe decline since the mid-1980s. Due in good measure to Vincent’s efforts, CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) voted in 2002 to add all seahorses to its list of species that may become threatened with extinction unless their trade is controlled (the so-called Appendix II). Her work thus greatly advanced the protection of all species of seahorses and their relatives while creating a new international instrument for marine conservation.

To learn more about Vincent, visit her bio online: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanda_Vincent.