John Pohl

I was born and raised on a homestead in Alaska, which gave me both a love of the written word (from lots of reading-time beside the fireplace on winter nights) as well as an insatiable thirst for adventure (fleeing bossy sisters into the wilderness will do that to you.) Daydreams inspired by the television program “The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau” led me to study at various marine science summer camps in Prince William Sound. I harassed the marine scientists with ceaseless questions, and gradually envisioned a life path.

After high school I headed south to different waters: the oceanography program at Humboldt State University on the Northern California coast. My college years were marked by a war between three passions: marine science, collegiate rowing, and sleep. I persevered on the degree path, however, eventually escaping Humboldt State University in California with a B.S. degree in biological oceanography.

Since then I’ve been on or near the water. I’ve worked as a deckhand and marine science teacher aboard tall ships in the Pacific Northwest, a boat handler for various seabird and sea otter studies in Southcentral Alaska, and a fisheries observer aboard commercial fishing boats in the Gulf of Alaska and Bering Sea.

Eventually, this hopscotch of jobs led me to a fisheries biology and oceanography position with the US National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Juneau, Alaska. I worked on a variety of projects, ranging from genetic studies of salmon and rockfish, to high seas ecology work aimed at assessing the effects of climate variation on ecosystems in the Gulf of Alaska, Bering, and Chukchi Seas.

In 2007 I left NOAA to aid a family member in need, and to pursue with partners a project organized around certain ecommerce trends. Long term I believe the US economic situation is going to negatively impact funding for marine research and marine conservation. With pressures growing from environmental degradation worldwide, any country’s reduction in research and conservation funding will affect the whole.

I hope to play a role in reversing this slide by marrying my interests of science, entrepreneurship, and writing. It is increasingly possible, via effective service of consumers and businesses, to create revenue streams derived from profitable and recession-resistant areas of the economy. These may in turn be directed towards any and all causes we feel are important. In my case, this is ocean research and conservation.

Ours is an era of communication and cooperation. There has never been such a promising time for collaboration between science, business, and the public. But we can’t wait. The time to act is now.

It is an exciting time to be alive!

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