10 May We have new visiting researchers! :) Dana Wright and Yajie Liu

Hi there! A few weeks after Constance Rambourg’s visit, we welcome Dana Wright and Yajie Liu, researchers from the Arctic University of Norway. They have been staying in Santiago de Compostela since late-April and for several weeks, enhancing the collaboration with our team.

Yajie Liu has been collaborating with Prof. Sebastián Villasante and Dr. Pablo Pita, from the EqualSea Lab, in the last 10 years, developing proposals under H2020 framework and Norwegian Research Council, and co-chairing the Working Group on Resilience and Marine Ecosystem Services on the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES WGRMES).

As part of her sabbatical, Yajie will stay for three months in Galicia, exchanging research ideas for future collaborations, potential proposals and projects; and trying to work on a couple of papers related to aquaculture and fisheries in terms of climate change and ecosystem services.

Yajie is supervising Dana’s Ph.D., so she is joining her on this research visit to the University of Santiago de Compostela for several weeks.

Dana Wright is a Ph.D. student in the Marine Resource Economics research group at UiT The Arctic University of Norway. Dana came to UiT in 2020 after working as an Economist for Fisheries and Oceans Canada for three years, and she received her Master of Arts in Economics at McMaster University in Canada in 2017.  Dana is currently working on her thesis which is focused on using econometrics and other statistical methods to assess the economic impacts of climate change on the lobster fisheries in Canada.

In her free time, Dana likes to dance, paint, and travel, and she is having a good time exploring the beautiful city and surrounding area of Santiago de Compostela.

Yajie Liu is an associate professor with the Faculty of Bioscience, Fisheries and Economics, UiT the Arctic University of Norway. She is a resource and environmental economist with over 15 years research experience into economics and management of fisheries and aquaculture at regional and global scales, especially extensive knowledge in Canada, Norway and China. She holds a Ph.D. in Resource and Environmental Economics from the University of British Columbia, Canada, and a M.Sc. in International Fisheries Management from the University of Tromsø, Norway.

Her research interests include applied microeconomics, bioeconomic modelling, econometric analysis, and evaluation of ecosystem services. Her research topics have ranged from optimization of marine resources uses, evaluation of environmental issues associated with commercial and recreational fisheries and aquaculture, economic impacts of climate change, environmental taxation to life cycle cost (LCC) and life cycle analysis (LCA) of aquaculture technologies. She has been teaching Fisheries Economics, Resource and Environmental Economics, Land Economics and Project Evaluation at both Bachelor and graduate levels. She has been a member of expert committees including the European Union (EU) and French Research Council.

Dana’s presentation about her Ph.D. research

On Tuesday, May 10, Dana gave us a presentation about her Ph.D. work, related to the economic impacts of climate change on the lobster fisheries in Canada. After their interesting introduction, Dana and the team members had a very enriching dialogue on the matter. In the coming weeks, Yajie will also share a presentation with the EqualSea Lab team some aspects of her research.