The ASOC Campaign Team includes people from all over the world, who work as ASOC experts on a wide range of subjects, representing the members of the Coalition on Antarctic issues. All are experts in their fields, and many have extensive Antarctic experience to accompany their education and environmental advocacy credentials. The team is dedicated to the pursuit of the ideals of the preamble of the Antarctic Treaty: that Antarctica and the Southern Ocean should be reserved for peace, science and protection of the Antarctic environment.
Secretariat Staff
Jim Barnes, Executive Director. A co-founder of ASOC in 1978, Jim received his BA at Northwestern in 1966 and his law degree from the University of Michigan in 1970. Currently living in Villamblard, France, Jim has devoted the past thirty-eight years to working with environmental organizations around the world. He received the International Environmentalist of the Year award from the National Wildlife Federation in 1991, the Order of the Golden Ark from the Dutch Royal Family’s foundation in 1998, and the Sierra Club’s Earth Care award in 2004.
Claire Christian, Director of the Secretariat. Claire received an M.A. in International Affairs at American University, School of International Service in May 2008. She worked as Program Assistant at the National Council for Science and the Environment in Washington, DC from December 2003 – May 2006, and has worked with ASOC since 2007.
Danny Elias, Social Media Coordinator. Daniel earned an M.A. in Global Environmental Policy from American University's School of International Service in December of 2010. He has honed a strong background in marine policy through ASOC, the Hubbs Sea World Research Institute and various other marine and environmental non profits. He has worked with ASOC for the past year and a half.
Aron Golberg, Advisor. Aron is retired from the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) where he served as an attorney for 22 years. Among other international legal issues, he helped develop the Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty, the first five annexes to the Protocol, and the implementing legislation for these instruments. Prior to his time at EPA, he was an attorney at the U.S. Department of Justice.
Deidre Zoll, Assistant to the Director. Deidre’s academic background is in Environmental Policy and Planning, receiving an M.A. in Global Environmental Politics at American University. Previously she worked as an Administrative Secretary at the University of Alaska Anchorage and then as an Undergraduate Admissions Counselor and Recruiter at Alaska Pacific University. Deidre has assisted ASOC since 2006.
Campaigners
Africa
South Africa
Estelle Van der Merwe, Advisor to Fisheries and Protocol Campaigns
Estelle has been involved in various areas of conservation during the last 15 years. She acted as the Wildlife Rehabilitation Crisis Manager during the MV Treasure oil spill off Cape Town in 2000, when more than 20,000 African penguins were oiled and successfully rehabilitated. She was a board member of the International Alliance of Oiled Wildlife Responders (IAOWR), and has worked closely with a variety of national and international NGOs and IGOs. Estelle has attended ACAP meetings as the ASOC representative and has attended seven CCAMLR meetings and three ATCMs. She works closely with the South African government and with many African governments to further the protection of the marine environment and Antarctica.
Asia
Japan
Ayako Sekine, Krill Campaign Country Organizer
Ayako has been involved in environmental campaign and research for Greenpeace in Japan and other civil society Organizations for 15 years, focusing on ocean pollution, toxic waste and climate change issues. With regard to marine environmental protection, she has worked on ocean dumping, pollution from land-based sources, and carried out on-board research on illegal trout fisheries in the Okhotsk Sea. She has a Bachelor of Education degree.
South Korea
Jie Hyun Park, Krill Campaigner
Jie Hyun originally studied interpretation between French and Korean and works as freelance translator in Korea. However, after her first child was hospitalized because of illness related to environmental pollution, she became interested in environmental issues. Since 2007, she has been working for the Antarctic Krill Conservation Project at CIES (Citizen's Institute for Environmental Studies) of Korean Federation of Environmental Movements in Korea. In addition, she works on campaigns for Antarctica in Korea and has written many articles and columns for newspapers and journals. Jie Hyun has been the NGO advisor to the Korean government delegation to CCAMLR since 2008.
Jeong Soo Kim, Ph.D.
Jeong Soo Kim is the organizing member of the Korean Federation for Environmental Movement., and is the Vice director of CIES(Citizen's Institute of Environmental Studies). He has a Ph.D. in Agriculture and Ecology (Seoul National University 2007).
Australia
Australia
Lyn Goldsworthy, ASOC Advisor and Krill Campaign Country Organizer
Born in New Zealand, Lyn moved to Australia in the mid-1970s to undertake a Masters in Environmental Studies, and has devoted her working career to activism. She has worked on Antarctic issues on-and-off since 1983, and has attended many Antarctic Treaty and CCAMLR meetings as NGO advisor to the Australian delegation or on the ASOC delegation. In 1990 Lyn received the New Zealand Antarctic Society Award and in 1991 was awarded an Order of Australia for services to conservation and environment, primarily for her work on stopping mining in the Antarctic. She served 12 years on the Australian government Antarctic Science Advisory Committee and has been to Antarctica twice to review Australia's environmental impact at their three continental bases. Lyn spent two years on the ASOC Board in 2005-2006. These days much of her work involves project facilitation and management and advocacy work. She has recently branched out into organisational network analysis and hopes soon to bring these skills to the not-for-profit sector.
New Zealand
Barry Weeber
Barry is currently an ASOC board member and has been involved in Antarctic conservation for nearly 20 years going back to campaigns against the Antarctic Minerals Convention during the 1980s and the campaign for the Antarctic Environmental Protocol. Barry's training is in science and environmental law. He has extensive international and national campaign experience in resource management and conservation law and fisheries management issues, and has served both as staff and as a board member of ENGOs. He has attended eleven CCAMLR meetings since 1990 as part of the New Zealand delegation, and has also attended two ATCMs. He works as a consultant working with environmental NGOs on deep-sea fisheries, marine management and conservation, and to a tertiary education organisation. For 15 years, Barry worked as the Royal Forest and Bird Society of New Zealand's senior researcher. Barry is a member of the IUCN Antarctic Advisory Committee (since 1996) and also a member of IUCN's World Commission on Protected Areas. He serves as vice-Chair of the Environment and Conservation Organisations of NZ (ECO).
EUROPE
France
Tina Tin, ASOC advisor
Tina conducted her Ph.D. research on the thickness of Antarctic sea ice at the University of Alaska Fairbanks (US) and holds a Masters of Engineering from the University of Cambridge (UK). She participated in two research cruises in the Ross Sea and presented papers at a number of international scientific conferences. Her passion lies in the protection of wilderness areas -in the polar regions and worldwide. When she is not focused on Antarctica, she works with WWF and otherenvironmental organizations to promote climate change science and policy in Europe and elsewhere. Tina is a native of Hong Kong.
The Netherlands
Ricardo Roura, Coordinator of ASOC's Protocol and Tourism Campaigns
Ricardo graduated as a geologist from the University of Buenos Aires in 1989 and completed a Master of Philosophy degree from Massey University (New Zealand) in 2001. He has participated in twelve Antarctic expeditions, including one winter-over, with Greenpeace International, the Argentine Antarctic program, and the University of Canterbury, New Zealand. He has served in a variety of roles including scientist, environmental manager, and field tutor. Ricardo has represented NGOs at various Antarctic fora since 1992 and has been an ASOC representative to the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meetings since 1997. He has also conducted research in Svalbard with the Arctic Centre, University of Groningen, The Netherlands, where he is completing his doctorate. He has published more than 30 scholarly articles on a range of polar issues.
Ukraine
Gennadi Milinevsky, Krill Country Campaign Co-Coordinator
Gennadi received his MS from Kiev State Universityin 1974 and his PhD from Tarasa Shevchenka University in 2001. He is Head of the Space Physics Department, National Taras Shevchenko University of Kiev and Principal Scientist at the National Antarctic Scientific Centre of Ukraine; Deputy Chief Editor of scientific "Ukrainian Antarctic Journal", and a delegate to SCAR. He served as Base Commander in the First Ukrainian Antarctic Expedition winter-over at Vernadsky Station, Antarctic Peninsula (from 6 February 1996 till 18 March 1997), as well as a member of the 5th, 6th, 7th and 10th Ukrainian Antarctic Expeditions. Gennadi has published more than 100 papers in scientific journals, and often serves as an NGO advisor to the Ukraine's CCAMLR delegation.
Irina Mikityuk, Krill Campaign Country Co-Coordinator
Irina holds a B.S. and M.S. in Microbiology from Kiev State University and undertook her undergraduate Studies in Public Relations at the Kiev Institute of Business and Technology. In 2004 she completed a Psychology Programme at National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. Working as a scientist in microbiology, Irina has been involved in conservation activities since 1995. She served as Executive Director of Ukrainian UNEP and then at Ukrainian Society of Bird Conservation as a PR expert in development and implementation of public outreach campaigns. Irina also has participated in some Greenpeace campaigns as a volunteer. From 2000 to 2003 Irina was an ASOC Protocol Implementation Coordinator in Ukraine and was a member of the ASOC delegation to the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meetings in 2000-2003. Besides her work for ASOC, she is working as a PR consultant at the Institute for Community Development.
UNITED KINGDOM
Sian Prior, IMO Coordinator and ASOC advisor
Sian is a marine scientist and policy specialist with a B.Sc. Marine Biology- Oceanography joint honours degree from the University of Wales and a Ph.D. in Marine Ecotoxicology from the University of London. Sian first worked on a range of coastal and marine management policy issues for the port and shipping industry. She then spent 15 years heading WWF's UK marine programme and later WWF's European marine programme. Her work has focused on marine governance and coastal management issues, including ecosystem-based management, marine spatial planning, marine protected areas, fisheries management, shipping, and oil and gas development. During this time Sian participated in a variety of international and regional policy frameworks, including heading WWF's delegation to the International Maritime Organization (IMO) for 10 years, concentrating on issues such as prevention of shipping accidents, designation of particularly sensitive sea areas (PSSAs), ships' routing, MARPOL Special Area Status. For the past five years, Sian has worked as an independent adviser on marine policy development focusing particularly on marine governance, spatial planning and protected areas, and shipping management in the Southern Ocean, north-west European waters and New Zealand's EEZ.
SOUTH AMERICA
Argentina
Virginia Gascon, Policy Advisor for the Antarctic Krill Conservation Project
Virginia is a specialist on krill and Antarctic toothfish issues as well as a wide range of other marine policy topics. She holds a Degree in Law from Universidad Autonoma (Madrid) and two Masters in International Law from the Free University (Brussels) and Georgetown University (Washington, DC). From 1997 to 2002, she consulted for the World Wildlife Fund International and US, as well as other environmental groups, on various environmental policy and fisheries issues. She also has experience as a lawyer and university teacher. Currently, she is the Policy Advisor for the Antarctic Krill Conservation Project.
Rodolfo Werner, Science Advisor for the Antarctic Krill Conservation Project
Rodolfo was born in Argentina and devoted many years of his career as a biologist to the study and conservation of Patagonian marine wildlife. He graduated as a biologist from the University of Buenos Aires (Argentina), obtained a Ph.D. in Biology from the University of Munich (Germany) and conducted postdoctoral work in marine zoology at the University of Guelph (Ontario, Canada). From 1997 to 2004, he consulted for World Wildlife Fund International, WWF-US, and other international organizations on marine conservation issues including marine protected areas, fisheries, marine policy, and protection of marine mammals. He has been on several trips to Antarctica as a staff naturalist. Currently, he is the Science Advisor for the Antarctic Krill Conservation Project.
Brazil
Ulisses Bremer, Krill Campaign Country Coordinator
Ulisses is a geographer and agronomist. He holds a teaching position in the Geosciences Institute of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), in southern Brazil, and has devoted much of his career to Antarctic geographical and environmental research. Regularly participating in Antarctic scientific expeditions since 1993, he has also contributed to the monitoring efforts conducted by the Brazilian Antarctic Programme (Proantar) to assess human impacts on the Admiralty Bay ASMA environment. Since 1992, he has taken part in many sustainability related activities. Ulisses is an active member for Friends of the Earth Brazil (NAT Brasil), conducting unofficial environmental inspections at many of the South Shetland Islands stations and tourism attraction places since 1996 as NAT Antarctic campaign coordinator.
Ricardo Burgo Braga, Krill Campaign Country Assistant Coordinator
Ricardo is a geographer currently finishing his Master's degree in southern Brazil at Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS). His work focuses on Admiralty Bay temperature variability and penguin biogeography. He is an associated researcher at NOTOS' Climatology Laboratory and the SIG Polar Laboratory/UFRGS, which have been collaborating for some 10 years on the King George Island GIS Project. He is also an independent environmental analyst and foreign language consultant, with a particular liking for field logistics and sustainability related issues and activities. He is a junior member of Friends of the Earth Brasil (NAT Brasil).
