Rashid Sumaila is Canada Research Chair (CRC) in Interdisciplinary Ocean and Fisheries Economics, Tier 1 and Professor, Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries and the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs (SPPGA). Dr. Sumaila specializes in bioeconomics, marine ecosystem valuation and the analysis of global issues such as fisheries subsidies, IUU (illegal, unreported and unregulated) fishing and the economics of high and deep seas fisheries.

Dr. Sumaila has experience working in fisheries and natural resource projects in Norway, Canada and the North Atlantic region, Namibia and the Southern African region, Ghana and the West African region and Hong Kong and the South China Sea. He has published articles in several journals including Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Journal of Bioeconomics, Land Economics, ICES Journal of Marine Science, Environmental and Resource Economics and Ecological Economics. Dr. Sumaila’s work has generated a great deal of interest, and has been cited by, among others, the Economist, the Boston Globe, the International Herald Tribune and the Vancouver Sun.

Selected Publications

1. Sumaila, U.R. (2021),  Infinity Fish: Economics and the Future of Fish and Fisheries. Cambridge, MA: Academic Press.
2. Sumaila, U.R.,  Cisneros-Montemayor, A.M., Dyck, A., Huang, L., Cheung, W.W.L., Jacquet, J., Kleisner, K., Lam, V.W.Y., McCrea-Strub, A., Swartz, W., Watson, R., Zeller, D., and Pauly, D. (2012). Impact of the Deepwater Horizon well blowout on the Economics of U.S. Gulf fisheries. Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, 69: 499-510.PDF
3. Sumaila, U.R. and Huang, L. (2012). Managing Bluefin Tuna in the Mediterranean Sea. Marine Policy, 36: 502–511. PDF
4. Collette, B.B., U.R. Sumaila and others (2011). High Value and Long Life—Double Jeopardy for Tunas and Billfishes. Science, 333: 291-292. PDF
5. Pereira, H. M., Leadley, P.W., Sumaila, U.R., and others (2010). Scenarios for Global Biodiversity in the 21st Century. Science, 330(6010): 1496-1501. Read article
6. Sumaila, U.R., Cheung, W.W.L., Dyck, A., Gueye, K., Huang, L., Lam, V.W.Y., Pauly, D., Srinivasan, T., Swartz, W., Pauly, D., and Zeller, D. (2012). Benefits of rebuilding global marine fisheries outweigh costs. PLoS ONE 7(7), e40542, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0040542. PDF
7. Sumaila, U.R. (2012). Seas, Oceans and Fisheries: A Challenge for Good Governance. The Round Table: The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs 101(2), 157-166. PDF
8. Swartz, W., Sumaila, U.R., and Watson, R. (2012). Global Ex-Vessel Fish Price Database revisited: a new approach for estimating ‘missing’ prices. Journal of Environmental and Resource Economics, DOI: 10.1007/s10640-012-9611-1. PDF
9. Srinivasan, T., Watson, R., Sumaila, U.R. (2012). Global Fisheries Losses at the Exclusive Economic Zone Level, 1950 to Present. Marine Policy, 36, 544-549. PDF
10. Halpern, B.S., Longo, C., Hardy, D., McLeod, K.L., Samhouri, J.F., Katona, S.K., Kleisner, K., Lester, S.E., O’Leary, J., Ranelletti, M., Rosenberg, A.A., Scarborough, C., Selig, E.R., Best, B.D., Brumbaugh, D.R., Chapin, F.S., Crowder, L.B., Daly, K.L., Doney, S.C., Elfes, C., Fogarty, M.J., Gaines, S.D., Jacobsen, K.I., Karrer, L.B., Leslie, H.M., Neeley, E., Pauly, D., Polasky, S., Ris, B., St. Martin, K., Stone, G.S., Sumaila, U.R., and Zeller, D. (2012). An index to assess the health and benefits of the global ocean. Nature, 488: 615-620. PDF
11. Ishimura, G., Herrick, S. and Sumaila, U.R. (2012). Fishing games under climate variability: transboundary management of Pacific sardine in the California Current System. Environmental Economics and Policy, DOI: 10.1007/s10018-012-0048-0. PDF
12. Sumaila U.R., Cheung W.W.L., Lam, V.W.Y., Pauly, D., Herrick S (2011). Climate change impacts on the biophysics and economics of world fisheries. Nature Climate Change, 1: 449-456. PDF
13. Lam, V.W.Y., Sumaila, U.R., Dyck, A., Pauly, D., and Watson, R. (2011). Construction and first applications of a global cost of fishing database. ICES Journal of Marine Science, 68(9): 1996-2004. PDF
14. Sumaila, U.R., Khan, A., Dyck, A., Watson, R., Munro, G., Tyedmers, P., and Pauly, D. (2010). A bottom up re-estimation of global fisheries subsidies. Journal of Bioeconomics, 12: 201–225. PDF
15. Sumaila, U.R. (2010). A cautionary note on individual transferable quotas. Ecology and Society, 15(3): 36. PDF
16. Dyck, A. and Sumaila, U.R. (2010) Economic impact of ocean fish populations in the global fishery. Journal of Bioeconomics, 12: 227–243. PDF

Awards

• University of British Columbia’s 2016 Killam Faculty Research Prize winner in the Applied Science, Sciences Senior Category
• 2017 Volvo Environment Prize

Full-time faculty