SOEI

Worldwide greater attention is being given to the oceans and their role in both our shared environment futures and in developing sustainable economies in different contexts. California State University, Northridge (CSUN) has launched a new Sustainable Ocean Economy Initiative (SOEI) through its University Institute for Sustainability. The purpose of this important initiative includes:

To become a hub for the research and community engagement being done by other CSU universities and forefront work being done by other California and national universities across all disciplines so that that broader work in the field is linked to the SOEI web site for easy reference. Many of those thought and practice leaders in the field are brought together by SOEI for conversations and collaborative projects across disciplines and contexts.

To engage with and foster active, collaborative, and mutually supportive working partnerships with those agencies, foundations, and organizations at work in the region and the state dedicated to building sustainable ocean environments and/or a sustainable ocean economy.

To gather and provide easy website access to influential, informative, and innovative articles, reports, and other resources that can inform the work of those working to craft the future of the LA Region’s and California’s sustainable ocean economy.

To gather/convene, learn from, and directly connect with national and international models that can expand collaborative working relationships fostered by SOEI as well as informing regional and state approaches to developing a sustainable ocean economy.

CSUN & Ocean Economies Development

Located in the City of Los Angeles (LA), CSUN has extensive working relationships with the region across many fields and disciplines. There relationships are based on the strengths of CSUN and on the needs and priorities of the region and the state. LA and surrounds has a significant economic connection with the ocean it adjoins and has had for a long time. But the nature of the economic connections between the LA economy and the oceans is evolving and changing. There is a commitment to making the future of the region’s future ocean economy smart, sustainable, innovative, and significant component of the region’s economic future.

CSUN has close working relationships with other California universities, particularly other universities that are part of the California State University system. A number of those universities have been and/or are becoming more engaged with the current and developing ocean economies in their respective California regions. CSUN is well positioned to draw together the network of scholars to foster collaboration and provide different models and approaches that can help each region consider a wider range of possibilities.

CSUN’s faculty in each field have connections to other scholar in their respective fields that would allow them to follow the leading research and formative conversations with direct application to or implications for the future of the LA regional sustainable ocean economy. CSUN is one of the most diverse universities in the country. It also has a wide network of international connections with over 140 active international collaborative agreements with universities around the globe. CSUN is well position to find and engage the leading innovative models worldwide for the evolution of sustainable ocean economies and the preservation and restoration of ocean ecologies in many different global contexts. The CSUN SOEI will have its home in CSUN’s Institute for Sustainability which will work across all CSUN colleges and departments to move the initiative forward. CSUN’s SOEI already has in place: