Marine Policy Institute

Topical Focus

The range of policy issues to be addressed by the MPI is broad.  Selection of themes for analysis will draw heavily from the research strengths of Mote Marine Laboratory and the needs of the community identified, for example, through discussions with policymakers and stakeholders.

Likely Policy Institute topics include ocean zoning and fisheries use issues, coastal and land management practices, sustainable seafood practices and conservation issues that pertain to larger aquatic animals such as marine mammals, sea turtles and sharks.  Accordingly, the topical coverage of the Policy Institute should be viewed as open-ended and responsive to the needs of its constituents.

An initial topic will be Florida’s red tide, which has presented itself as a priority issue for the Institute and activities from all three functional areas – scientific translation and mediation, human dimensions research and training ‑ will address it.  The Policy Institute expects to issue its first white paper on red tide. It will summarize the most salient features of red tide science, provide an overview of socioeconomic and health impacts, explore the legal and regulatory framework pertaining to monitoring, mitigation and control of red tide and offer a set of policy recommendations.  In this way, the red tide paper will be a model for discussions of new issues in the future.