Log in
Professor Barnes conducts world leading research on international regulation of fisheries. This informed his contribution to a research programme on Commonwealth fisheries policy. The research has helped to raise awareness, stimulate debate and change attitudes towards the international regulation of fisheries at the ministerial level and the local level through the Commonwealth study tour. The programme findings were published in `From Hook to Plate' and disseminated at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting 2009. Commonwealth members accepted the findings in this report, including the specific recommendations on fisheries regulation presented in Barnes's research.
Research on the status, distribution and ecology of sea turtles at the University of Exeter has driven national and international conservation policy, engaged millions of people worldwide and raised substantial funding for conservation. Governments including the UK, Cayman Islands, Cyprus and Gabon have used this research in making legislation and multi-million pound management decisions. Development of open-access animal tracking tools has facilitated a global network of over 135 countries, with more than 300 projects tracking thousands of animals from 118 species. The ability to adopt tracked animals online has attracted millions of visitors and raised funding for conservation projects world-wide.
Research into North Atlantic fisheries history undertaken under the auspices of the Maritime Historical Studies Centre (MHSC) has spawned, and been sustained by, a series of externally funded projects since 1996. The outputs of this research programme have influenced marine policy, heritage strategy, legal decisions and public educational provision concerning the relationship between human societies and marine animal populations over the long term. Such impacts have been delivered through searchable online stores of validated historical data, commissioned reports, websites (for academic, public and school audiences), presentations, dayschools, exhibitions, guided tours, books and journal articles.
The UK Cetacean Strandings Investigation Programme (CSIP), led by the Institute of Zoology, first identified accidental entrapment in commercial fisheries (by-catch) as the cause of mass mortality of UK common dolphins. Those by-catch diagnostic criteria are still widely used (UK and overseas). CSIP cetacean mass stranding investigations led to a successful ban on naval exercises around the Canary Islands and modification of Royal Navy exercises to reduce harm to cetaceans. CSIP research on brominated flame retardants in porpoises led to an EU-wide ban; follow-up work during the REF period verified the success of the ban by demonstrating declining chemical concentrations.
The research resulted in primary legislation and provided government with the evidence used when implementing the measures set out within legislation. Specifically, this concerned:
This work, together with connected public outreach, was awarded the Queen's Anniversary Prize in 2011 for excellence in research supporting better governance of the ocean.