I’ve always been passionate about polar ecosystems and their conservation, which led me to a PhD within the COPE project (COnservation management of Polar Ecosystems), where I investigated the population structure of Antarctic benthic amphipods. With this coming to an end, I am starting to think about what I want my future career to look like. Which led me to apply for an internship at the CCAMLR Secretariat.

As a scientist it is important to provide solid and valuable scientific output and present it in an attractive way to policy makers. This opportunity will give me valuable insights into how scientific results are presented to the Scientific Committee and how they are translated to conservation recommendations. I will work within the Science team at the Secretariat, diving into their VME framework and extensive dataset. During my internship, I learned so much about the structure of CCAMLR, how conservation measures are applied, how data is handled and the many ways data is collected throughout the Convention Area. I hope to be able to submit a paper to the WG-EMM to revert some attention back to VMEs.

I am very thankful for my time at the Secretariat and how much I learned during my time here. Working at the Secretariat has inspired me to continue working in this field, to produce valuable scientific output to conserve the beautiful Southern Ocean biota.