Yoshitoka Ota is the Co-Director of the Nereus Program and a Nippon Foundation Senior Research Fellow at The University of British Columbia. As a social anthropologist, he specializes in fishing practices, including the economics, social organization and lifestyles attached to this activity. Dr. Ota has interdisciplinary fisheries management and field-based research experience in Micronesia (Palau), Indonesia (post-tsunami Aceh), the UK and France (English Channel) and Australia (Victoria). Prior to joining The University of British Columbia, Dr. Ota was based at the Ocean Policy Research Foundation in Tokyo where he worked on issues concerning community-based management, coastal habitat reconstruction (satoumi) and marine spatial planning.