Co-Convenors: Jennifer Boldt (Canada), Vladimir Kulik (Russia), Chaolun Li (China), Jameal Samhouri (USA), Motomitsu Takahashi (Japan) and Chang-Ik Zhang (Korea)

Invited Speaker:
Natalie Ban (James Cook University, Australia)

Multiple natural and human stressors on marine ecosystems are common throughout the North Pacific, and may act synergistically to change ecosystem structure, function and dynamics in unexpected ways that can differ from responses to single stressors. Further, these stressors can be expected to vary by region, and over time. This workshop seeks to understand responses of various marine ecosystems to multiple stressors, and to identify and characterize critical stressors in PICES regional ecosystems including appropriate indicators of their impacts. The goal is to help determine how ecosystems might change in the future and to identify ecosystems that may be vulnerable to the combine impacts of natural and anthropogenic forcing. Contributions are invited which identify and characterize the spatial and temporal extent of critical stressors in marine ecosystems (both coastal and offshore regions) of PICES member countries, and in particular the locations at which multiple stressors interact. Contributions will include a review and identification of broad categories of indicators which document the status and trends of ecosystem change at the most appropriate spatial scale (e.g., coastal, regional, basin) in response to these multiple stressors. This workshop is linked with the topic session titled “Ecosystem responses to multiple stressors in the North Pacific” but is designed to provide more in-depth examination and discussion of the spatial and temporal extents of critical marine ecosystem stressors and their potential indicators. It will assist with progress towards the goals of PICES WG 28 on Development of Ecosystem Indicators to Characterize Ecosystem Responses to Multiple Stressors (http://www.pices.int/members/working_groups/wg28.aspx).