AquaClimate: Aquaculture, Climate Change, and Knowledge: Adaptation and Innovation

Ultimately, the changing conditions influence aquaculture production, a significant sector along the Norwegian coast. Future sustainable development of the aquaculture sector depends on the ability to respond to these changes through adaptation strategies and innovation processes. The need for accumulating scientific and professional knowledge about climate change and its impact in the aquaculture sector, including both industry and governance, is therefore critical. This project aims at exploring how the aquaculture sector relates to, and applies various forms of knowledge in their strategic planning and policy making. Through an inter-disciplinary consortium consisting of anthropologists, biologists, economists and sociologists, as well as representatives from the aquaculture industry, the project will make use of mixed methods to investigate the interrelationship between knowledge generation, innovation and adaptation. Document analyses, literature review, in depth interviews with CEO, business entrepreneurs and authorities at local, regional and national level, will provide valuable qualitative data that are analysed to identify main constraints and opportunities for the industry to adapt and develop innovative efforts in relation to climate change. Output from the project is expected to include typologies for characterizing and identifying adaptation and innovative responses to climate change in the aquaculture sector, as well as guidelines for how scientific and professional knowledge can be applied in these processes. The project draws upon previous and on-going research projects in the field of innovation in the aquaculture industry and adaptation to climate change in coastal communities in the North.