In my last post I introduced two scenario planning processes facilitated by The Nature Conservancy (TNC). The bulk of my fellowship position has been in support of these processes. In that post, I offered an overview of scenario planning, and outlined developments in the federal fishery scenario planning process with the Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC). In this post, I share progress of the Oregon Dungeness crab fishery climate change scenario planning process.

Scenario Planning for Oregon’s Dungeness crab fishery

TNC launched the Dungeness crab scenario planning process early in 2020, with the expectation of completing the exercise by Summer 2021. This process was modeled off a successful framework used with PFMC, and tailored to fit Oregon’s crab fishery and its socio-economic connections. Throughout the majority of my fellowship, I assisted my supervisor, Gway Kirchner and Scenario Insights (a contracted scenario planning facilitator) to integrate a broad set of representative voices from across the Oregon coast in the process.    

It is important to plan for the future of this fishery because Dungeness crab is (generally) Oregon’s most lucrative single species fishery. It is also one of the only Oregon fisheries that operates in winter months, so it offers employment opportunities and economic relief to natural resource-dependent coastal communities during a slow time of year. The Dungeness fishery has been faced with some big challenges over the past five years, namely an increase in whale entanglements and high bio toxin levels (bio toxin levels are monitored throughout the season, and area closures are implemented as needed to ensure consumer safety). These challenges are symptomatic of early climate change effects, and could intensify as time goes on. A scenario planning process offers managers, fishermen, industry, researchers, markets and communities the opportunity to look into the future at different potential situations. These processes offer a framework to collaboratively brainstorm ideas and decisions that could improve the ability of all relevant parties to adapt to a changing world.  

Planning during a Pandemic

The state scenario planning process is designed for robust input from all stakeholders and to work collaboratively to research, create and deepen the scenarios. Unfortunately, the COVID-19 pandemic, which began during the early stages of this process, made it impossible to host in-person programs. Thus, the process was redesigned into a pandemic-friendly, online collaborative format.

By summer, the Dungeness crab scenario planning process had been moved to virtual format and the kickoff meeting, scenario creation workshop and smaller focus groups were successfully held. The virtual format required a lot of flexibility and hard work to connect with relevant parties, plan and conduct meetings, and ensure all voices were heard especially if some participants were unfamiliar with how to operate an online platform. While online collaboration was challenging at times, the process yielded robust results.

I will briefly zoom in on the August 12th scenario creation workshop, because it was a great example of collaboration through an online format. TNC and Scenario Insights were able to offer a truncated, online version of the January 2020 federal scenario creation workshop, complete with speakers and a guided framework design process. Participants, facilitators and the core team worked together to produce the diagram below, which shows four plausible scenarios along two axis: viability of crab fishing in 2040 and variability of stock and ocean conditions in 2040 (fig.1). Similar to the Federal scenario creation workshop, this integrated the experience, knowledge and concerns of managers, researchers, fishermen and other stakeholders. After the scenario creation workshop, two subsequent virtual meetings were held with a scenario drafting team to fill in social, economic, regulatory and ecosystem aspects of each scenario.

Next Steps

After the wintertime rush of the 2020/2021 commercial crab season, TNC will facilitate discussions with a broader diversity of stakeholders to ground-truth the scenarios, examine how individuals see these scenarios fitting into their individual realities, and document potential ideas or applicable action items that emerge from those dialogues. TNC hopes to finish this process by summer 2021.

Fellowship Wrap Up

I am so appreciative of my Natural Resource Policy Fellowship with The Nature Conservancy. Over the past 15 months, TNC site has folded me into a number of dynamic marine and coast conservation projects, including two innovative climate change scenario planning process. This fellowship has been a tremendous opportunity for me to connect my academic background with current climate change resilience work. Not to mention, excellent collaboration and networking opportunities. My position closes at the end of December, so this will be my final blog post. I look forward to bringing my skills in social science, climate change research and outreach to my next career steps.

The photo below shows me holding a Pacific red rock crab during a TNC employee trip to the Oregon coast in October, 2019. Both Red rock crabs and Dungeness crab are often caught in recreational traps (or “pots”) across the Oregon coast. This trip was the first of many highlights from my time at TNC, and an opportunity to share my inordinate love for the Oregon coast with new colleagues. Thank you to Oregon Sea Grant and The Nature Conservancy for offering so many opportunities to grow as an early career social scientist.

In my Spring 2020 blog, I wrote about the Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) scenario planning process. As an Oregon Sea Grant fellow based at The Nature Conservancy (TNC), I have held a support role in parts of this process, and have observed the exercise since October 2019. In that post I also mentioned the beginnings of an Oregon-specific Dungeness crab fishery scenario planning process facilitated by TNC.

In this entry I will focus on developments in the scenario planning process for the Pacific Fishery Management Council. My next blog (coming very soon) will examine how the Oregon Dungeness crab fishery scenario planning process builds on and deviates from the PFMC process. If you would like to go back and learn more about PFMC scenario planning, please read (or re-read) my previous posting HERE.  

Scenario Planning Overview

Before I share more on the PFMC scenario planning process, I will quickly go over some general history of scenario planning.

Scenario planning is a tool that was first used by the oil industry in the 1960’s, the process was so successful that it has since been adapted by companies, NGOs, financial institutions and government entities around the world. Managers and decision makers use this strategy to avoid tunnel vision when visualizing, and preparing for the future. You can think of scenario planning as a tool used to plan for future uncertainty, and a practice that helps decision makers develop appropriate strategies to meet that uncertainty (Wilkenson & Kupers 2013).

Click HERE for a great read from the Harvard Business Review on the history of scenario planning.

Scenario developers draw upon literature, knowledge of experts and data sets that reflect current conditions, trends and future predictions. They use this information to create a set of plausible and relevant pictures that show what the future could look like. Scenarios must be plausible, but not necessarily probable; a distinction that is important because it is easy default to planning based off subjective predictions or extrapolations of the current state. Using these default methods can be extremely limiting because they doesn’t leave space for divergence from an expected trajectory (Wilkinson & Kupers 2013).

Once formed, “scenarios” are placed on axis. Each axis reflects a scale of no change (or low change) to extreme change of a future system. The number of scenarios developed differs by process, but the PFMC process uses four scenarios. After scenarios are created, plausibility is cross checked with stakeholders, scenarios are researched, then turned into stories that illustrate these possible futures. Managers and decision makers integrate stories and their broader implications into strategy development, strategic planning processes and risk assessments.

Scenario Planning for West Coast Fisheries

The Pacific Fishery Management Council is one of the eight Regional Fishery Management Councils in the United States. PFMC recommends management measures for all federal fisheries conducted off of West Coast states, including California, Oregon and Washington (PFMC). PFMC and TNC are working together to conduct a scenario planning process under the current Fishery Ecosystem Plan: The Climate and Communities Initiative. The goal of this scenario planning process is to identify socio economic, environmental, cultural and biological challenges that fishery stakeholders may face over the next two decades (PFMC 2020 (B)).

January Workshop

In my aforementioned, post I described the January scenario planning workshop held by PFMC and TNC, facilitated by the consulting firm Scenario Insights. This workshop included 80+ fishermen, managers, tribal members and scientists in a brainstorming session that examined the question: How will climate change impact West Coast species and communities over the next 20 years? (PFMC 2020 (B)). The workshop produced a set of four scenarios, organized across two axis: Climate and ocean conditions and species abundance/availability (Fig 1.). Post meeting, scenario components, axis and scenario descriptions were sent to researchers, the council community and other relevant parties. these groups conducted further research, validated plausibility, and added details, data and further scenario illustration.

This presentation, created by Jonathan Star of Scenario Insights, illustrates the scope of the January workshop:

Scenario Development

On August 2, 2020, the PFMC Climate and Communities Core Team released the set of fully developed scenarios for West Coast fisheries in 2040. This document includes:

• Information on projected future environmental conditions, demographics, ocean uses, technology, economics and societal values, policy environment

• Four refined scenarios (see Fig. 2)

• Descriptions of each scenario

• How each West Coast federal fishery may look under a given scenario.

Next Steps

The PFMC Climate and Communities Core Team will begin meetings with stakeholders in early 2021 to review these scenarios ground-truth their contents. The core team will examine perceived challenges and opportunities related to the future of fisheries, and actions needed for commercial fisheries to remain profitable in the future. The core team is also interested in stakeholder thoughts on how existing successful conservation benefits can be maintained in the future, and what needs to be done to avoid future overfishing or habitat degradation. The Pacific Fishery Management Council will likely take final action during their March or September Meetings. Ideally actionable items will be identified during this process, and a work plan will be developed to ensure sustained momentum towards a future of climate-smart fisheries on the West Coast.

Sources

Wilkenson, A., Kupers, R. (2013) Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2013/05/living-in-the-futures

Pacific Fishery Management Council. Who We Are And What We Do. (Website) https://www.pcouncil.org/about-the-council-2/

Pacific Fishery Management Council (2020) (A). Supplemental CCI workshop presentation 1: Developing future scenarios for climate change in the California Current Ecosystem (presentation). https://www.pcouncil.org/documents/2020/03/g-3-a-supplemental-cci-workshop-presentation-1-follow-up-from-a-workshop-co-sponsored-by-the-nature-conservancy-and-pacific-fishery-management-councilin-support-of-the-fishery-ecosystem.pdf/

Pacific Fishery Management Council (2020) (B). Follow up from a workshop co-sponsored by The Nature Conservancy and the Pacific Fishery Management Council in support of the Fishery Ecosystem Plan Climate and Communities initiative. https://www.pcouncil.org/documents/2020/03/g-3-a-supplemental-cci-workshop-presentation-1-follow-up-from-a-workshop-co-sponsored-by-the-nature-conservancy-and-pacific-fishery-management-councilin-support-of-the-fishery-ecosystem.pdf/

Pacific Fishery Management Council’s Climate and Communities Core Team (2020). 2040: Scenarios for West Coast Fisheries. https://www.pcouncil.org/documents/2020/11/scenarios-for-west-coast-fisheries-climate-and-communities-initiative.pdf/

I am an early career scientist who will be re-emerging into the job market sometime in the next few months. Luckily, I have been armed with a set of skills that were greatly boosted during my time as a Sea Grant Fellow.

As I begin to look ahead, I am finding it useful to focus on common threads that have tied my professional interests together thus far. It is my hope that by writing about this process, I will inspire others to consider how their long-standing interests tie into their career path.

I earned my BA at a small liberal arts school in central Arizona. I chose the university because course work was hands on and they offered students an opportunity to build their own degree program. I began my freshman year 100% certain that I would pursue a degree focused on sustainable agriculture and small business development. Food systems were a lens through which I hoped to explore how humans rely on the natural world to fulfill our most basic needs. I grew up in a neighboring landlocked state, so at this point agriculture was the most approachable vector for me to explore food systems.

On a whim, I spent my second semester of college at my university’s field station on the Gulf of California and quickly rerouted my degree path to focus on marine and coastal systems. My coursework shifted to technical field skills like conducting snorkel surveys and algae transects for the remainder of my degree program. The most meaningful part of this time in Mexico, however, was interacting with the nearby indigenous communities and fishing communities who relied very directly on the ocean for both sustenance and economic stability. Even though I had veered away from agriculture, I found myself gravitating back towards food systems.

I continued this thread in OSU’s Marine Resource Management M.S. program, where my research examined the coupled human-natural systems at play in Oregon’s fishing communities and commercial fisheries. After my successful thesis defense, my main career aspiration was to deepen my understanding of these coupled systems in coastal and marine environments.

As of August 2020, I am about ten months into my position as an Oregon Sea Grant Natural Resource and Policy Fellow at The Nature Conservancy (TNC). This position stood out to me because it offered an opportunity to delve into climate change impacts on West Coast communities (see my past post on scenario planning). During my time at TNC I have been deeply engaged in scenario planning, but I am also involved in a number of projects that integrate human needs and ecosystem needs and environmental uncertainty, and I am even serving on a committee that focuses on social-ecological systems.

This fellowship has taught me the complexities of balancing human and environmental needs at a far deeper level than academia could afford. As a Sea Grant fellow, my work has integrated state and federal policy processes, management and regulatory entities, as well as the ways in which stakeholders/communities, tribes, non-profits and researchers take part in the decision making process. It has been fascinating to see how all of these entities and processes tie back to marine food systems here on the West Coast.

Although I have transitioned from high desert farming to foggy fishing docks, my career thread still prioritizes the connections between humans and the natural world, through the lens of food systems. While I have thoroughly enjoyed a deeper dive into fishery policy and management, I have found a deep passion for building relationships with resource users and communities, particularly in the realms of education and collaboration. By clarifying my long-standing career priorities, my experience and the type of work that I really enjoy, it has become easier to target my next steps.

If you find yourself in a similar position to mine, it may be useful to ask yourself these questions as well:

What are some factors that have tied your educational and professional career together thus far?

Which experiences did you love, which you rather not repeat? How can you build on the great ones?

What type of work keeps you motivated and engaged, what type of work is more challenging for you?

As another Sea Grant fellow pointed out, a whole lot has changed since our last blog posts. The world seems to have turned upside down in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Our everyday lives have shifted dramatically, and many of us are struggling with a deep sense of uncertainty for what is to come. This pandemic has put a spotlight on our national (as well as personal and global) need to improve flexibility, planning, and response times in the face of current and future change.  On both large and small scales, we are asking ourselves how we can best cope with the crisis at hand, and how we can better prepare for inevitable future surprises. On the bright side, this tumultuous time has created space for us assess our societal, personal and professional priorities as we move forward. In particular, many of us are looking for tools to increase our resilience and adaptive capacity as time goes on.   

Although completely unrelated to Covid-19, the members of the Oregon Marine Team at The Nature Conservancy (TNC) have been asking similar questions for almost a year, but in the context of fisheries. The team has been examining uncertainty through a process known as Scenario Planning, focused on the future of West Coast fishing, management, and the communities that rely on that industry. 

Scenario planning is a tool that was first created by the US military during World War II, later modified for use by the oil industry, and more recently been applied to a wide array of business and agency contexts, including the stock market and natural resource management. In essence, this method explores what may happen under different sequences events by helping managers and decision makers develop strategies to meet uncertainty. Under the direction of a consultant, TNC is collaborating with the Pacific Fishery Management Council (PFMC) (https://www.pcouncil.org/) on a multi-phase Scenario Planning process that examines climate change scenarios and related impacts on fisheries along the California Current System (CCS).  

The process includes 5 distinct steps: “Establish, research, create, validate and apply”. The “create” phase involves a scenario planning workshop, which took place in January 2020 in Orange County, California.  The workshop brought together upwards of 80 West Coast fishermen, managers, tribal members and scientists for an interactive brainstorming session that examined a central question: How will climate change impact West Coast species and coastal communities over the next 20 years (PFMC 2020)? By the end of the workshop, participants had successfully created a set of narratives (or scenarios) describing what the marine environment may look like in 2040. Since then, these scenarios have been refined and results will be ground-truthed and further researched over the coming months. (If you’re interested, click here for detailed information on the January workshop.)

As the PFMC process continues, The Nature Conservancy has launched another Scenario Planning initiative, this one with the state-managed Dungeness Crab fishery in Oregon. While Covid-19 related complications have delayed the process, we are deep into the planning process and we are remaining flexible in regards to timing as we plan our next steps.

There are a number of reasons why TNC is focusing their efforts on scenario planning for the Dungeness crab fishery:

• The fishery is important to coastal economies: In most years, Dungeness crab is the most economically important single species fishery in Oregon and across the entire US West Coast (Rasmuson 2013; Lee & O’Malley 2019).
• Dungeness crab stocks are projected to be impacted by a series of climate change components over coming decades, including marine heat waves (remember the ‘warm blob’), Hypoxia and Ocean Acidification (OA), and Sea Level Rise.
• In addition, the fishery itself will likely be impacted by increasing harmful algal blooms (HABs) containing toxic diatoms like domoic acid (DA), as well as whale entanglements.

These factors of change point to a significant access reduction to the fishery in coming decades, which may create ripple effects across cultural and socio-economic aspects of Oregon’s fishing communities. Over the coming year, TNC will utilize existing data, and gather knowledge from fishermen, managers, scientists and community members, to develop scenarios for fishing communities 20-50 years from now. The goal of this process is to contribute to future planning and decision-making abilities in coastal communities, in management and in the fishing industry itself (Borggaard et al 2019; Peterson et al 2003). 

Like many of us in the environmental sciences, I’m keenly aware of how climate change components are creeping into local, regional and global systems, and I am awaiting more dramatic shifts in my lifetime. Even so, the projected state of our planet in 20, 50 or 100 years remains abstract in my mind because of my limited scope of direct experience. Although COVID-19 may not be related to climate change, both pandemics and climate change have been intricately studied, and experts openly share concerns of issues to come. Our global response to Covid-19 spotlights how ill prepared we are for the abstract, but inevitable. For me, this pandemic has cemented the importance of tools like scenario planning to better prepare for our future.

References:

Borggaard, D & Dick, D & Alexander, M & Bernier, M & Collins, M & Dudley, R & Griffis, R & Hayes, S & Johnson, M & Kircheis, D & Kocik, J & Morrison, W & Saunders, R & Sheehan, T & Saba, Vincent. (2019). Atlantic salmon climate scenario planning pilot report. 10.13140/RG.2.2.20713.85604.

Lee, E and O’Malley, K (2020) Big Fishery, Big Data, and Little Crabs: Using genomic methods to examine the seasonal recruitment patterns of early life stage Dungeness crab (Cancer magister) in the California Current Ecosystem. Frontiers in Marine Science. Doi. 10.3389/fmars.2019.00836

Peterson, G., Cumming, G., Carpenter, S. (2003) Scenario Planning: A tool for conservation in an uncertain world. Conservation Biology. Vol. 17, No. 2.

Pacific Fishery Management Council (2020) Follow up from a workshop co-sponsored by The Nature Conservancy and the Pacific Fishery Management Council in support of the Fishery Ecosystem Plan Climate and Communities initiative. https://www.pcouncil.org/documents/2020/03/g-3-a-supplemental-cci-workshop-presentation-1-follow-up-from-a-workshop-co-sponsored-by-the-nature-conservancy-and-pacific-fishery-management-councilin-support-of-the-fishery-ecosystem.pdf/

Rasmuson L (2013) The biology, ecology and fishery of the Dungeness crab, Cancer magister. Adv Mar Biol 65:95–148