- About -

The Seafood and Fisheries Emerging Technologies (SAFET) concept was the brainchild of WWF’s Bubba Cook, who wanted to bring the fisheries monitoring, control and surveillance (MCS) practitioner community together to explore and discover the potential of emerging, and potentially disruptive, technologies to improve the conservation and management of our world's fisheries. Bubba convened a broad coalition of industry, government, and non-government institutions to host the first Emerging Technologies event in 2014 in Honiara, Solomon Islands.

 

This was followed by the second in 2016 in Auckland, New Zealand, with a focus on the incredible advances in technology in recent years leading to a theme of "Anything is Possible". The most recent event was held in Bangkok, Thailand, in 2019, and focused on the increasing connections between technology used in fisheries and the growing information needs of the seafood supply chain, leading to the theme of "Illuminating the Supply Chain." With each iteration the SAFET network has grown, culminating with the most recent meeting in Bangkok, which was attended by 240 participants across 125 different institutions from 40 countries. 

 

The global pandemic has made in-person conference attendance impossible for the time being, but fortunately technology has an answer for that, too! This year WWF has joined forces with Environmental Defense Fund’s (EDF) Oceans program to bring you the 2020-21 SAFET conference. EDF’s ocean technologies team brings expertise in the field of fisheries technologies and policy, digital communications, as well as a strong network of fisheries and seafood practitioners around the globe. EDF Oceans works in 11 countries partnering with local communities and governments to implement real solutions to fisheries and climate resilience challenges.

 

Emerging technology has always been at the core of this event and we are here to learn about how innovative and evolving technologies can help solve some of the most challenging problems in the fisheries and seafood space.