Molly Powers-Tora
Acting Team Leader, Ocean Management and Literacy, Pacific Community (SPC)
Molly Powers-Tora, MPA-DP, is committed to facilitating ocean literacy and capacity development, integrated ocean management and sustainable livelihoods in Small Island Developing States vulnerable to climate variability and change.
She arrived in Fiji in 2005 as an environmental resource management Peace Corps Volunteer and has since come to call the Pacific home. Prior to joining the Pacific Community (SPC) in 2013, Powers-Tora gained experience as an Ocean Classroom onboard educator, a GLISPA fellow, manager of a corporate foundation and field manager of a coral reef conservation NGO.
Now she leads a multidisciplinary team working to improve ocean management and ocean literacy across SPC’s 26 Pacific Island member states. She coordinates activities across multiple projects ranging from maintaining a sea level observation network and developing ocean information products to helping delimit maritime zones and building Pacific capacity in ocean science and earth and marine observations.
Powers-Tora is a Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS) Steering Committee member and the focal point for SPC’s OceanTeacher Global Academy Regional Training Centre. She is an avid sailor, diver and lifelong ocean and island lover.
Speakers & Moderators
Angelika Brandt
Head of Department Marine Zoology, Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum Frankfurt
Beth Fulton
Lead, Integrated Marine Management, CSIRO Oceans & Atmosphere
Deputy Director, Centre for Marine Socioecology
Judith Giblin
Senior Technical Officer in Oceanography in the Geoscience, Energy and Maritime Division/ Pacific Community
Melissa Iwamoto
Director and Principal Investigator, Pacific Islands Ocean Observing System (PacIOOS)
Marjolaine Krug
Senior Scientific Advisor, OCIMS, Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE)
Mojib Latif
Professor, University of Kiel and researcher, GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel
Roshan T Ramessur
Co-Chair OA-Africa
Advisory Member, The Ocean Foundation
Associate Professor, University of Mauritius
Derrick Snowden
Chief, Operations Division, US Integrated Ocean Observing System Office at NOAA/National Ocean Service
Detlef Stammer
Professor and Director of the Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability, University of Hamburg
Janice R. Trotte-Duhá
Special Adviser, Directorate-General for Scientific, Technological and Nuclear Development of the Brazilian Navy
Ramasamy Venkatesan
National Institute of Ocean Technology, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India, Chennai India
Martin Visbeck
Professor of Physical Oceanography, GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel and Kiel University
