Placement: Coral Triangle Center, Sanur, Bali, Indonesia
Jeremy Pivor, majored in environmental biology at Washington University in St. Louis, is passionate about international environmental issues and ocean conservation. Interested in the interconnection between science and policy, he has conducted research ranging from disease ecology near Missouri caves, oyster reefs in North Carolina, coral reefs in Madagascar, and lobster diversity in the Sargasso Sea. His interest in international environmental policy has been developing ever since he co-founded Washington University Students for International Collaboration on the Environment (WUSICE). With WUSICE he organized a climate change conference between American and Chinese students. A memorandum featuring joint solutions to climate policy issues was presented to the lead U.S. and Chinese negotiators at the 2010 climate change negotiations in Cancun, Mexico. The following year he organized the first Washington University delegation to the climate change negotiations in Durban, South Africa. Concurrently, he was selected to be an international youth delegate for the Sierra Student Coalition (SSC) where he focused on building U.S.-China relations and co-initiated the first youth water policy working group. Sailing with his grandparents every summer, Pivor fell in love with the sea at an early age. Studying abroad affirmed his passion for the ocean. For three months he lived with the Vezo in a remote coastal fishing community in Madagascar working on marine conservation. He assisted biodiversity research of the coral reefs and in education initiatives for local youth in the community. He left Madagascar with a sense of responsibility to dedicate his life towards solving ocean issues to support communities, like the Vezo, who depend on the ocean for their survival. Following his experience in Madagascar, Pivor studied marine biodiversity and conservation of the Sargasso Sea. Aboard a brigantine tall ship, he sailed from St. Croix to Massachusetts via Bermuda. En route, he trained in sailing the ship and conducted both ocean science and policy research. In order to better inform management strategies he continued his research for a thesis project, investigating the genetic diversity of Caribbean Spiny Lobster larval cohorts in the Central Atlantic. Jeremy is also president of his university’s emergency medical service, plays saxophone, and is an avid scuba diver. His goal is to represent the United States government at the international level. He aspires to work on the interconnection between science and policy by promoting policies that best reflect scientific consensus for the vitality of both the oceans and coasts.
The Coral Triangle is an area covering 5.7m square kilometers of tropical marine waters of Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Solomon Islands and Timor-Leste. Known as the “Amazon of the Seas,” the Coral Triangle is home to half of the world’s coral reefs, 76 percent of know coral species and 37 percent of known coral reef species. It is the global center of marine biodiversity and provided benefits to more than 100 million people who reside within its outline. The Coral Triangle Center’s mission is to enhance local capacity in regional marine conservation in the Coral Triangle by providing training, sharing best on-site practices, establishing learning networks, and building public-private partnerships. In 12 years of service, the Center has conducted more than 100 training sessions with partners for some 2,000 regional practitioners, hosted numerous international exchanges, and promoted policy dialogues for decision makers involved in sustainably managing the region’s marine resources.