Miranda Jones

Research Themes

: WATER AND LAND
: MODEL FACILITIES

Staff Profiles

e-mail address: miranda.jones@uea.ac.uk
Title: Miss
First Name: Miranda
Surname: Jones
Institution: University of East Anglia
Postal Address: School of Environmental Sciences
University of East Anglia
Norwich
NR4 7TJ
Current Position: PhD Researcher
Research Interests: The Socio-economic implications of marine climate change in the UK

PhD Researchers Profile

Tyndall Research Theme: CIAS
Duration of your PhD: 2013
Thesis's Supervisor: Dr. William Cheung (UBC, CEFAS); Dr. Rachel Warren (Tyndall, UEA); Dr. John Pinnegar (CEFAS); Dr. Stephen Dye (UEA, CEFAS)
Funder: DEFRA/ CEFAS (ME5102)
My Thesis' Abstract: Climate change has numerous impacts on marine ecosystems, affecting both biodiversity and the goods and services that they provide. Nearly two-thirds of exploited marine fishes in the North Sea, for example, shifted in mean latitude or depth or both over 25 years as sea temperature increased. Recent studies also project that climate change may lead to large-scale redistribution of potential catch with tropical countries suffering substantial losses and high-latitude countries enjoying significant gains. Such changes will have implications for fisheries, conservation, aquaculture and other maritime activities. Understanding the ecological and socio-economic impacts of climate change is therefore vital to the development of mitigation and adaptation policies. However, a recent scientific review commissioned by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) indicates a major gap in quantitative assessment of risk from climate change through fish stocks and fisheries. This PhD project aims to improve our understanding of the socioeconomic implications of marine climate change in the UK. Specifically, the project aims to apply ecological and economic models to examine the costs associated with adapting to shifting distribution patterns, the threats and opportunities posed by climate change to fisheries, aquaculture, conservation and other associated maritime activities in the UK. This project involves: adapting and applying a dynamic bioclimate envelope model and CIAS (Community Integrated Assessment Systems) to project potential changes in distributions of fish and shellfish in the UK waters based on the climate scenarios developed by the UK Climate Impacts Programme (UKCIP); the development of bio-economic models to evaluate the effect of species distribution shifts on spatial fishing patterns (e.g., Hutton et al. 2004) and the resulting consequences for revenues, profits and coastal economies.