Natural Capital Project’s new managing director

Marine ecologist MARY RUCKELSHAUS has been named managing director of the Natural Capital Project, a conservation partnership of Stanford’s Woods Institute for the Environment, the University of Minnesota’s Institute on the Environment, The Nature Conservancy and the World Wildlife Fund.

A longtime collaborator with the Natural Capital Project, Ruckelshaus will oversee all work at the project, including science, fundraising, communications and hiring. She has been a research scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service since 1997. Prior to that, she was an assistant professor of biological sciences at Florida State University.

“I am thrilled about this chance to pursue the opportunities now open for transforming the way people think about nature,” Ruckelshaus said. “Worldwide, people are starting to recognize the societal benefits of nature and are looking for pragmatic ways of incorporating them into decisions – of governments, corporations and communities.”

Ruckelshaus has worked on marine conservation and reserve-design issues for more than two decades. Prior to becoming Natural Capital Project managing director in September 2010, she managed the Ecosystem Science Program at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Seattle.

After earning a bachelor’s degree in human biology at Stanford, Ruckelshaus obtained a master’s degree in fisheries and a doctorate in botany from the University of Washington. She is a member of the board of directors of The Nature Conservancy and chief scientist at the Puget Sound Partnership, which is working to restore the Puget Sound ecosystem in Washington state.

“At the Natural Capital Project, we are convinced that our best hope for improving human welfare is through protection and restoration of Earth’s life-support systems,” Ruckelshaus said. “By developing and applying tools quantifying ecosystem services, I think we and our partners can fundamentally change investment and management decisions so nature’s benefits to people are realized.”