PhD Researcher Alifa Haque awarded best student presentation at Sharks International 2022

PhD Researcher Alifa Haque awarded best student presentation at Sharks International 2022
PhD researcher Alifa Haque gave her award-winning presentation at Sharks International 2022

Congratulations to NbSI PhD researcher Alifa Haque, who was recently awarded the best student presentation at Sharks International 2022, out of several hundred abstracts submitted and presented both online and in-person.

Alifa Haque is a marine biologist focusing on conserving sharks and rays in the global south context, supervised by Prof Nathalie Seddon and Dr Rachel Cavanagh. Alifa’s talk “Can fishers be the conservation heroes we need them to be?” explored the barriers of fishers to adhere to regulations and marine conservation efforts, taking a case study of sawfish and guitarfishes (both Critically Endangered) in the global south. Through a large number of interviews with fishers of the Bay of Bengal, an array of barriers were revealed as impeding fishers’ abilities to adhere to marine fisheries regulations & pro-conservation acts. Alifa emphasised how behavioural change is a two-way street where policymakers & managers need to change as well as those fishing in those regions with endangered fish under threat. A paper based on these findings is soon to be submitted.

Alifa was presented with a signed book at Sharks International 2022, held in Valencia, Spain in October 2022. Learn more about Alifa’s work on her research profile page.