Putting fishers’ knowledge to work : conference proceedings August 27-30, 2001

This Report documents the presentations given at the World’s first international conference on the management value of the resource knowledge of small scale, indigenous and commercial fishers. The conference was inspired by Dr Robert (Bob) Johannes, whose 1981 Book ‘Words of the Lagoon’, was the first serious study in this area, and was co-hosted by the UBC Fisheries Centre, UBC First Nations House of Learning and the BC Aboriginal Fisheries Commission. Over 200 people representing 23 countries and 36 North American First Nation representatives attended. The conference sought to provide a way to ‘step beyond’ fishers’ frustration that their knowledge is ignored and scientists’ standard position that the knowledge is anecdotal, and can not easily be captured in the reports,…