1. By Jennifer Allford October 3, 2013
A seagrass farmer teaches Chui-Ling Tam how to tie seedlings in Wakatobi
National Park on Kapota Island, Indonesia.
Sustainability Spotlight: Chui-Ling Tam
From writing stories to broadening the narrative
Chui-Ling Tam, assistant professor in the
Department of Geography in the Faculty of
Arts, was working as a journalist in Singapore
when she went scuba diving in Indonesia and
had an epiphany: local fishermen were
following the boats with the scuba divers and
had to wait for the tourists to get out of the
water before they could get to work fishing.
“Basically, I realized it was critical to try to
understand conservation and development in
terms of how the local populations were
affected by it,” says Tam of her sudden
awakening in 1996. “I thought there was a lot
we needed to do in terms of thinking about
how local populations were able to take part
in sustainable development.”
She packed it in as a journalist, came back to
Canada and dove into a PhD in resource
management. “I actually never intended to
leave journalism,” she says. “I thought I was
going to have a break for a couple of years
doing a PhD and then I’d go back. But I never
did.” Instead, Tam has immersed herself in
the social challenges of resource
development and environmental
management in marine communities.
“The benchmark for understanding sustainability is the holy trinity of economic, social and environmental sustainability,” she
says. “In a lot of cases the environmental lobby has become so successful at this that social sustainability in places with weak
civil society and weak political systems is really endangered by the union of economic and environmental interests.”
How sustainability issues are communicated — and who gets to take part in the conversation — also plays a big role in
achieving a balance between economic, social and environmental factors. In Canada, anyone can join the dialogue about
sustainability: “But the same thing isn’t happening in developing countries, where local people aren’t strong enough or secure
enough politically to take part.”
They’re being left out of the conversation. Take Wakatobi, where Tam was scuba diving all those years ago. It’s become a
world biosphere reserve, which clearly benefits the environment, but she says it’s less clear how it will help the 100,000
people who live in the protected area. “It’s really troubling,” says Tam.
“How are people going to benefit and how are they able to express their priorities and decisions on what their lives should
be?”
Spotlight on Sustainability is an ongoing series profiling the work of students, faculty and staff. To submit story ideas please
contact the Office of Sustainability.
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