BRIDGES Ocean Talks #6

Fish on the Move: mainstreaming connectivity science in community-based fisheries management

Join us for the sixth webinar in the BRIDGES Ocean Talks series!

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📅 Tuesday, November 10, 2026, at 1:00 PM (UTC+4)

🗨️ Speaker : Luisa Fontoura, an oceanographer and field ecologist based in Australia

Abstract

Globally, community-managed marine areas are emerging as conservation strategies to reverse coral reef degradation and overfishing. However, as the population grows and climate change intensifies, significant challenges remain in balancing socioeconomic needs, sustainable fisheries, and biodiversity conservation. The challenge is magnified as fishery resources are not static because of migration between fishing grounds and conservation areas, and therefore require coordinated management strategies that align with ecological processes to promote recovery and resilience of sustainable fisheries.

In reef systems, fish larval dispersal across the seascape is critical to maintaining species and fishery stock persistence through gene flow and population replenishment. Therefore, incorporating ecological connectivity shaped by fish movement into the design of community-managed area networks can support conservation and sustainability goals whilst revealing the degree of coordination required among communities connected by fish movement.

The Fish on the Move project starts from a simple observation: marine conservation areas are static, but fish are not. It combines hydrodynamic modelling, genetics, underwater surveys and Traditional Ecological Knowledge to map fish connectivity and inform the degree of management coordination across institutions and community-based managed areas to promote resilience in small-scale fisheries.

During this webinar, Luisa Fontoura, oceanographer and postdoctoral researcher at the Oceans Institute (Australia) and member of the team leading the Fish on the Move project, will present the project and address several questions linking marine connectivity and the LMMA network, such as management scenarios, socio-economic benefits and local knowledge.

Speaker

Luisa Fontoura

Oceanographer and field ecologist.

She is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the Oceans Institute, Australia and honorary researcher at Macquarie University, Australia. Her research focuses on seascape connectivity and its role within complex socioecological systems to improve fisheries management and conservation measures. She has navigated the areas of spatial ecology, biogeography, ocean dynamics, and marine conservation planning. This interdisciplinary foundation has shaped her research interests toward an integrative approach that bridges marine ecology and applied conservation. She has led and co-lead research projects focused on mapping fish movement patterns across locally managed marine areas in the South Pacific and Western Indian Ocean regions. Ultimately, these projects were focused on identifying effective fisheries management practices that enhance biodiversity conservation while supporting the sustainability of small-scale fisheries within networks of locally managed marine areas connected through fish movement patterns.