Peter Baker

GUEST CONTRIBUTOR

Peter Baker directs the Pew Charitible Trusts's marine conservation work in Canada, the Arctic, and New England. The work includes protecting special habitats, encouraging ecosystem-based fisheries management, and addressing the entanglement of right whales in fishing gear. Since joining Pew in 2007, Baker has led efforts to establish science-based annual catch limits, protect forage fish, and safeguard sensitive marine habitats, including deep-sea corals.

Before joining Pew, Baker was campaign director of the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen's Alliance. His responsibilities included campaign design and implementation, education of government officials, media relations, and public speaking. In his five-year tenure, he developed the first fishery in New England to work under firm catch limits with the Georges Bank Cod Hook Sector, a fishermen-run, community-based harvesting co-op. He also defeated efforts to change the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act to allow allocation of fish quotas to onshore processors. Earlier, Baker held positions with the Sierra Club in North Carolina and Vermont and was field director for the Citizen-Labor Energy Coalition.