Cernas

CERNAS

Research Center
for Natural Resources,
Envioronment and Society

João André Evaristo de Matos Gago

João André Evaristo de Matos Gago
João Gago entire academic career, from his bachelor's and master's degrees to the completion of his doctorate in 2010, has been in the field of marine biology and aquaculture of sea urchins and marine fish larvae. But since 2014, the PI research focused his research htowards freshwater ecosystems, particularly in fisheries management of the local fishermen community “Avieiros”, but as well studying the environmental impact of invasive alien species on ecosystem structure, functioning and services. In this context, he was a member of several FCT projects such as FRISK (Freshwater fish invasion risk assessment: identifying invasion routes) and ISO-INVA (Quantifying food web dynamics in invaded stream communities), and currently is co-PI of the MEGAPREDATOR project. This accumulated experience has allowed him to know better the stakeholders involved in inland fisheries, particularly with regard to their attitudes, behaviours and objectives for the fishing activity, recognising the existence of imbalances and conflicts between social, economic and nature conservation interests that are challenging to deal with. In fact, he has published several scientific papers in this research area since 2015 and recent PI research is focused on recreational fisheries management. In professional terms, the PI was awarded with research fellowships between 1998 and 2000, the year in which he began teaching at the IPSantarém (currently as an Assistant Professor). As well as teaching subjects such as Biology, Ecology, Biodiversity, Aquaculture and Management and Conservation of Natural Resources, he has also carried out various organisational tasks at the Higher Agricultural School of Santarém. From 2010 to 2023 João Gago belonged to MARE research centre as associate member but in the 2023, due to IPSantarem strategic reasons, changed to CERNAS.