Draško Holcer

Draško Holcer is senior curator at Croatian Natural History Museum (Zagreb) and president of the Blue World Institute of Marine Research and Conservation (Veli Lošinj). Draško holds a Ph.D. on the Ecology of the common bottlenose dolphin in the central Adriatic Sea from University of Zagreb. During his career, he has been devoted to research and conservation of mammals – from bats, voles and mice to Cetaceans. His current interests are marine conservation biology, Cetacean population studies and marine conservation policies. He is a member of ACCOBAMS Scientific Committee and acts as conservation policies advisor to national and international organisations and authorities. He published over dozen books and book chapters, over 20 peer-reviewed papers and over 50 conference papers and abstracts. In the last five years he participated in several IPA Interreg projects, including NETCET – Network for the Conservation of Cetaceans and Sea Turtles in the Adriatic and Adriatic+: sharing marine and coastal cross management experiences in the Adriatic basin. In cooperation with ISPRA (Rome), he organised and carried out two aerials surveys of the Adriatic sea providing first estimates of abundance and distribution of Cetaceans, sea turtles and giant devil rays. Currently, he is coordinator of joint “Collective actions for improving the conservation status of the eu sea turtle populations – LIFE Euroturtles” project, between 6 EU countries and 9 partners.