Rainer Froese, Ph.D. (Board Chair)

Dr. Rainer Froese is a Senior Scientist at GEOMAR Helmholtz-Centre for Ocean Research, Germany. He has a proven track record of successfully leading large international groups such as the FishBase team and Consortium, and delivering products such as web portals (www.fishbase.org), CD-ROMs (e.g., Catalogue of Life), and multi-authored books (e.g., FishBase 2000) on time. He was a founding member of international biodiversity initiatives, such as Species 2000 and OBIS, and a member of GBIF Governing Board. He is the principal architect of FishBase which he further developed in his work as Senior Research Scientist at the International Center for Living Aquatic Resources Management (formerly ICLARM, now The WorldFish Center) where served for more than 10 years. He specializes in fisheries and aquatic biodiversity issues and has authored and co-authored over 100 scientific publications. He is one of the few Europeans who received the prestigious Pew Fellowship Award in Marine Conservation.

Daniel Pauly, Ph.D. (Deputy Board Chair)

Dr. Daniel Pauly is a Professor and Principal Investigator of Sea Around Us Project of the Fisheries Centre of the University of British Columbia in Canada, after many years at the International Centre for Living Aquatic Resource Management (ICLARM), then in Manila, Philippines. Dr. Pauly's scientific output, mainly dedicated to the management of fisheries, and to ecosystem modelling, comprises numerous contributions to peer-reviewed journals, authored and edited books, reports and popular articles, and the concepts, methods and software he co-developed are used throughout the world. This applies notably to the ecosystem modelling approach incorporated in the Ecopath software (www.ecopath.org), to FishBase, the online encyclopedia of fishes (www.fishbase.org), and the global mapping of fisheries trends (www.seaaroundus.org).

In 2001, Dr. Pauly was awarded the Murray Newman Award for Excellence in Marine Conservation Research sponsored by the Vancouver Aquarium, and the Oscar E. Sette Award of the Marine Fisheries Section, American Fisheries Society. He was named an 'Honorarprofessor' at Kiel University, Germany in late 2002. In 2003, he was named one of UBC's Distinguished University Scholars and elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (Academy of Science). In 2004, he received the Roger Revelle Medal from IOC/UNESCO, and the Award of Excellence of the American Fisheries Society.

In 2005, Dr. Pauly received the International Cosmos Prize, a prestigious award granted by the Expo’90 Foundation of Japan, for research excellence with a global perspective. His environmental commitment has also earned for him the prestigious Volvo Environmental Prize in 2006 and the ECI Prize and Ted Danson Ocean Hero Award in 2007. In 2008, Dr. Pauly was bestowed yet another accolade when he was awarded the 4th Ramon Margalef Prize on Ecology and Environmental Sciences. Recently, Dr. Pauly was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Alicante in Spain, as approved unanimously by the Governing Council at the proposal of the Faculty of Science, during the celebration of the St. Thomas Aquinas feast day on 28th January 2013.

Mary Ann Bimbao, Ph.D. (Member)

Dr. Mary Ann Bimbao is FIN’s Executive Director. As Director, she is tasked with managing the projects of FIN, providing administrative and financial support, and coordinating between research partners and donors. She has more than 20 years of experience in various projects involving people's organizations, non-government organizations, research organizations and academic institutions in the developing world. She specializes in the fields of aquaculture economics and gender issues. She has created databases on socioeconomics significantly contributing to the development of RESTORE (Research Tool for Natural Resource Management, Monitoring and Evaluation), a tool that comprises a set of participatory research procedures and computer-based analysis for sustainability indicators, while with the International Center for Living Aquatic Resources Management (formerly ICLARM, now The WorldFish Center). Also, while at ICLARM for over 13 years, she served as the Secretary of the Network of Tropical Aquaculture Scientists and Assistant Editor of its newsletter Aquabyte. She managed the information exchanges among over 500 network scientific members in 100 countries.

Sheila Vergara, Ph.D. (Member)

Dr. Sheila Vergara is currently the Biodiversity Information and Management Director of the ASEAN Centre for Biodiversity (ACB), spearheading the dissemination and integration of information about biodiversity by connecting parties, government and stakeholders. Prior to ACB, she worked for Conservation International - Philippines as Senior Marine Biodiversity Specialist. Her foremost concern at CI-P was managing the Sulu Sulawesi Seascape Project. She was also responsible for providing technical leadership and support for the implementation of CI-Philippines’ global marine conservation strategy in the Philippine Archipelagic Hotspots. She moved to CI-P in May 2005 after a 9-year employment at The WorldFish Center, where she managed the ReefBase database and supervised the implementation of the broad-based Coastal Management Training Program in Vietnam and Indonesia. She was also a lecturer on Aquatic Ecosystems at the School of Environmental Sciences and Management of the University of the Philippines in Los Baños. Her areas of expertise include behaviour change campaigns, information management systems, climate change, and conflict resolution.

Annabelle Trinidad (Member)

Ms. Annabelle Trinidad is the Environmental Economist and PES Specialist/Team Leader of the Knowledge Management Project of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), untill April 2013. She is also a Sustainable Financing Specialist at the Coral Triangle Initiative (CTI) Southeast Asia, and a Marine Protected Area (MPA) Financing Specialist at the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). She spent more than 10 years of her professional life at the International Center for Living Aquatic Resources Management (formerly ICLARM, now The WorldFish Center), initially as Program Assistant of the Resource Assessment and Management Program, and subsequently as Coordinator of the Network of Tropical Fisheries Scientists and as Assistant Editor of its newsletter FISHBYTE, and later on, got involved in research projects on co-management, socioeconomics of fisheries and resource valuation. Ms Trinidad has authored several journal articles and technical reports including "Valuation of tropical coastal resources: theory and application of linear programming" and "Bioeconomics of the Philippine small pelagic fishery". After her stint with ICLARM, Ms. Trinidad joined the USAID-funded Coastal Resource Management Project as Policy Advisor. She worked with national agencies on various aspects of coastal resources policy including foreshore management, fisheries, protected area management, delineation of municipal waters, development of national coastal resources framework and establishing and strengthening the coastal office of the Philippine Department of Environment and Natural Resources. She was, for some time, Resource Economist of the ADB and JBIC-funded Fisheries Resource Management Project.