Co-Convenors: Masahide Kaeriyama (Japan), Olga Lukyanova (Russia), Steven Rumrill (U.S.A.) and Thomas Therriault (Canada)
Invited Speaker:
Neil Banas (University of Washington, U.S.A.)
Takayuki Shiraiwa (Hokkaido University, Japan)
Vladimir Shulkin (NOWPAP/POMRAC, Russia)
Jing Zhang (East China Normal University, PR China)
Land-sea interactions are widely recognized as an important component of coastal ecosystem processes
throughout the North Pacific Region. Anthropogenic activities in upland and coastal areas can significantly alter
the productivity of coastal ecosystems and disturb the communities that depend on them. Human activities such as
pollution or overfishing can result in immediate and direct impacts on biological productivity. However, there are
an increasing number of indirect impacts such as altering the flow of ecosystem-transboundary materials (ETMs)
that are responsible for the enriched productivity of many northern coastal systems. In Asia, the dissolved iron that
is transported from the Amur River basin into the Sea of Okhotsk and Oyashio Region is now recognized as a major
regulator of the primary productivity in these coastal waters. Similarly, disruptions in the timing and amplitude of
riverine discharges from the Columbia River Basin (Pacific Northwest) result in significant alterations of salinity
regimes, sediment transport, biological productivity, and fisheries returns throughout the region influenced by
the Columbia River plume. Anthropogenic impacts such as changes in land use, artificial river channelization,
hydropower structures, and urbanization disrupt and alter the flow of ETMs thereby reducing the productivity in
these coastal ecosystems. Furthermore, these alterations can lead to the manifestation of other stressors in coastal
ecosystems such as jellyfish blooms, hypoxia events, and harmful algal bloom (HAB) outbreaks. This session will
focus on: 1) how ETMs (e.g., dissolved iron, carbon and other elements) are transported from upland ecosystems
into coastal ones; 2) what mechanisms regulate the supply of ETMs and how the downstream transport of these
impact the productivity (primary production) of coastal systems; 3) how anthropogenic impacts disrupt the ETM
system and resulting changes downstream including increased ecosystem vulnerability; 4) how anthropogenic
impacts directly reduce coastal productivity; and 5) exploration of potential adaptive management strategies
based on the ecosystem-approach to protect the ETM system to ensure sustainability of coastal ecosystems and
stability for the coastal societies depending on them.