Dr. Stacy Jupiter
Executive Director, Global Marine Program
Dr. Stacy Jupiter is the Executive Director of the Global Marine Program. She is a recognized thought leader in ocean conservation with over two decades of experience in tropical coastal ecosystems research and management. She has built her career by developing innovative, transdisciplinary solutions that integrate local cultural practices with field research to design management that protects both nature and people, including pioneering holistic integrated watershed management for downstream ecosystem and public health.
Stacy joined WCS in 2008 as an Associate Conservation Scientist, ran the Fiji Country program between 2009 and 2014, and held the position of Melanesia Regional Director from 2014 to 2024. As Melanesia Regional Director, she established the Solomon Islands program and while driving major growth in the Fiji and Papua New Guinea programs. She brought together a variety of community, investor, and scientific partners to design and create two new large-scale marine protected areas in PNG, which represented the most comprehensive MPA consultations in the country to date and more than tripled the ocean area under protection nationally.
Beyond the Pacific, Stacy has experience in community development and engagement from Central Africa, where she served as a rural fisheries agent in Gabon and is also part of a number of global marine conservation initiatives transcending her scientific, implementation and rights-based expertise. She has published well over 100 articles and book chapters, including in Science, Nature, and The Lancet, on key oceans issues, including small-scale fisheries and community-based fisheries management, MPAs and marine spatial planning, natural resource law and governance, coral reefs and climate responses, integrated land-sea management, environmental underpinnings of One Health, and rights-based approaches to conservation.
Stacy received an A.B. from Harvard University, her Ph.D. from University of California-Santa Cruz, and in 2019 was named a MacArthur Fellow. Stacy is based in Suva, Fiji.
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