Alifa Bintha Haque

I teach at the Department of Zoology, University of Dhaka where I am the founder and team leader at the Bengal Elasmo Lab. I teach undergraduate and post-graduate courses and conduct marine research under this umbrella. I have just completed my doctoral studies at the Nature-based Solutions Initiative in the Dept. of Biology, Oxford and British Antarctic Survey, Cambridge. My research- "Towards a socially just sustainable fishery preserving sharks and rays in the Bay of Bengal", aims to prepare a sustainability model (replicable for similar contexts in the Global South) for threatened species of sharks and rays in close conjunction with the fishing communities. It places a locally-driven, bottom-up approach from academic literature to action, a narrative absent in the current management regimes. I created a platform for research-based conservation actions collaborating with local fishers and traders to fill the dearth of knowledge on sharks and rays in Bangladesh and initiating actions for mitigating impacts. I launched a collaborative project involving fishers in knowledge co-creation and decision-making, which is socially just and environmentally sound. Since 2021, 10 fishing vessels voluntarily collect spatial data using a mobile app. This endeavour is a pilot for our technological innovation "FishSafe", an audio-visual device to record by-catch events at sea. Since, 2023 05 fishing vessels are piloting this technology. Fishers are incentivized by access to communication with other boats and land in the absence of mobile networks at sea. This will also act as a non-monetary and sustainable incentive to initiate an organized live release and self-regulated catch monitoring. I work at the challenging intersection of endangered species conservation and fisheries as a means of livelihood generation for fishers of Bangladesh. My vision is to generate a context-appropriate, community-empowered and collaborative fishery model with preservation and sustainability at its core.