Canadian Healthy Oceans Network (CHONe): An Academic–Government Partnership to Develop Scientific Guidelines for Conservation and Sustainable Usage of Marine Biodiversity

• Published in: Fisheries
• Main Authors: Snelgrove, Paul V. R., Archambault, Philippe, Juniper, S. Kim, Lawton, Peter, Metaxas, Anna, Pepin, Pierre, Rice, Jake C., Tunnicliffe, Verena
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Wiley 2012
• Subjects: Arctic; Pacific
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03632415.2012.696002; https://afspubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/03632415.2012.696002

ABSTRACT The Canadian Healthy Oceans Network (CHONe) research program formed to unite leading academic and government researchers with managers from Canada's national resource agencies to address an urgent need for better scientific information on marine biodiversity in Canada's Atlantic, Pacific, and Arctic waters. Specifically, the network is producing diverse scientific products to inform policy commitments in conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity resources. A common disconnect between science‐driven research and policy application results in a dearth of science information relevant to specific decisions that cannot wait for knowledge to accumulate. To narrow this gap, CHONe research structures around three interlinking and integrated themes of marine biodiversity, ecosystem function, and population connectivity. CHONe products span from baseline maps, databases, and barcodes as tools to understand processes and monitor future change; spatial and temporal predictive tools to maximize knowledge on biodiversity patterns; analytical and sampling tools to characterize and assess biodiversity and habitat relationships, decision‐making frameworks for sustainable, integrated ocean management; new findings on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning relationships; to specific advice, data input, models, and frameworks for current ocean planning efforts.