Erich Hoyt has spent more than 35 years working with whales and dolphins and focusing on global marine conservation, especially in the areas of whale watching, marine ecotourism and marine protected areas. Erich is currently Senior Research Fellow with WDCS, the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society, in the UK, leads WDCS's Global Marine Protected Areas Programme, and co-directs the Far East Russia Orca Project and Russian Cetacean Habitat Project. The latter two are collaborations with Russian researchers that represent some of the first whale studies in the Russian Far East. Erich has been appointed to the Cetacean Specialist Group of the IUCN Species Survival Commission as well as the IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas. He is the author of 18 books and more than 500 papers, reports and articles. Erich's most recent book Marine Protected Areas for Whales, Dolphin and Porpoises (Earthscan, London, 488 pages), now in a completely revised second edition (2011) has been called the most important book on whale conservation written to date - a grassroots handbook for marine habitat conservation worldwide. He has helped to organize a new series of conferences for the International Committee on Marine Mammal Protected Areas, most recently in Martinique in 2011. His work in Japan includes helping to organize a symposium and gallery exhibition in Tokyo in December 2011 as part of the Beautiful Whale Project. He has travelled and spoken widely on marine conservation and science issues, collaborating with WDCS, IFAW, IUCN-WWF, the High Seas Alliance and at the invitation of various governments. An American-Canadian dual citizen, Erich currently resides in Scotland.