Project Seahorse wins 2025 President’s Fishery Conservation Award

Congratulation to the Project Seahorse team who have won the 2025 President’s Fishery Conservation Award from the American Fisheries Society. This award is presented to an individual or entity for singular accomplishments or long-term contributions that advance aquatic resource conservation at a regional or local level.

Project Seahorse, founded in 1994 by Dr. Amanda Vincent (UBC) and Dr. Heather Koldowey (London Zoological Society) is an award-winning team that has made measurable gains in marine conservation around the world. Using seahorse as their keystone species, they build knowledge and then translate it into effective action, creatively and collaboratively. When confronted with a problem, they take a multilayered approach to find solutions. This means Project Seahorse embraces many different ways of thinking at many spatial scales, with our work ranging from local seahorse populations to global policy and back again.

Dr. Villy Christensen had this to say about Project Seahorse: “What Project Seahorse has developed is incredible. First they started with international policies, including those of the UN Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). They applied their research to secure global restrictions on export trade in seahorses, which resulted in 2002’s listing of 46 seahorses species in Appendix II of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species. The fully marine fishes protected by CITES. It was not until 2013 that a second batch of marine species (numerous sharks) were also added to CITES Appendix II. And yes, Project Seahorse assisted in this development. Project Seahorse are fisheries conservationists at the local, national and international level.”

Dr. Sarah Foster was on hand at the 2025 AFS Annual Meeting in San Antonio, Texas to receive the award on the Project Seahorse Team’s behalf.