Austin Humphries is from the mountains of southwest Virginia and serves the Fish Innovation Lab as the East Africa specialist as well as the small-scale fisheries specialist. He leads the management of projects located in Kenya and Zambia, as well advises those focusing on small-scale fisheries. Humphries was part of the core group that convened in Washington, DC, to organize and assemble the initial Fish Innovation Lab ideas and structure in 2017.
Humphries is an associate professor at the University of Rhode Island and whose research focuses on the ecological and social dynamics of fisheries management. He has more than 10 years of experience working in tropical small-scale fisheries and lived in Kenya from 2010 to 2014. Much of Humphries’s work includes large field data-collection components, both underwater and on land, using mixed ecological and social methodologies. He strongly believes in collaborative interdisciplinary science as the most effective way to implement data-driven fisheries management solutions.
Humphries teaches undergraduate courses on fisheries and aquaculture, as well as a graduate course in ecosystem-based fisheries management. He holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Vermont, a master’s degree from Louisiana State University, and a doctorate from Rhodes University in South Africa. Humphries serves as an associate editor for the journal Frontiers in Marine Science, and as chair of the American Fisheries Society’s policy program.
More information on Humphries and his research group can be found at the Humphries Lab website.