Increasing sandalwood (Santalum spicatum) recruitment in regional Western Australia through mammal conservation. The highly prized sandalwood is the basis of an industry that employs over 100 people and generates $12 million export income annually in regional WA. Natural recruitment of sandalwood is poor. This project will build on research, conducted by Murdoch University and the Forest Products Commission, that indicates natural recruitment of the tree is greatly enhance in the presence of nat ....Increasing sandalwood (Santalum spicatum) recruitment in regional Western Australia through mammal conservation. The highly prized sandalwood is the basis of an industry that employs over 100 people and generates $12 million export income annually in regional WA. Natural recruitment of sandalwood is poor. This project will build on research, conducted by Murdoch University and the Forest Products Commission, that indicates natural recruitment of the tree is greatly enhance in the presence of native rat-kangaroos who cache the seeds. This project will train an APA(I) postgraduate through an industry based project that will evaluate increased recruitment of sandalwood by native mammal caching. Many of these mammals are Conservation Dependent or Threatened with extinction.Read moreRead less
Life history responses to habitat heterogeneity and implications for conservation. This exciting new research project will provide a novel understanding of how animals respond and adapt to environmental variation. This will fill a critical gap between ecological theory and real-world populations and initiate a major shift in how we view the relationship between environments and the species that inhabit them. Natural resource use practices like forestry are rarely considered compatible with biodi ....Life history responses to habitat heterogeneity and implications for conservation. This exciting new research project will provide a novel understanding of how animals respond and adapt to environmental variation. This will fill a critical gap between ecological theory and real-world populations and initiate a major shift in how we view the relationship between environments and the species that inhabit them. Natural resource use practices like forestry are rarely considered compatible with biodiversity conservation. This research will provide on-the-ground management recommendations to integrate such land uses with conservation, thereby providing both economic and conservation benefits to the Australian community.Read moreRead less
Practical, powerful and cost effective indicators of sustainable forest management for the conservation of biological diversity. Much debate about appropriate use of Australia's forests stems from uncertainty about the magnitude of impacts on abundances and distributions of forest-dependent species, a key indicator of sustainable management under the Montreal Process. An opportunity exists to develop new tools to substantially improve our ability to detect and assess change. This project will de ....Practical, powerful and cost effective indicators of sustainable forest management for the conservation of biological diversity. Much debate about appropriate use of Australia's forests stems from uncertainty about the magnitude of impacts on abundances and distributions of forest-dependent species, a key indicator of sustainable management under the Montreal Process. An opportunity exists to develop new tools to substantially improve our ability to detect and assess change. This project will develop optimal monitoring design and analysis strategies for detecting population trends against a background of natural fluctuation and observation error. It will result in templates for coherent reporting on indicators at regional and national levels. It will exploit recent findings regarding observation error in surveys, advances in statistical control processes, simulation methods, and power analysis to develop a world-class species monitoring system.Read moreRead less
Eradication of Phytophthora cinnamomi from infested haul roads and rehabilitated bauxite mine sites in the Eucalyptus marginata forest. This project will develop tools to (a) eradicate the devastating soil-borne plant pathogen Phytophthora cinnamomi from natural ecosystems; and (b) confirm this success using molecular and traditional diagnostic tools. The method will allow large areas of previously infested jarrah forest to be returned to a disease-free status post mining.
Industrial Transformation Training Centres - Grant ID: IC210100034
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$4,986,473.00
Summary
ARC Training Centre for Healing Country. Healing Country aims to be a world-first on-country capability, employment and business development training centre for Indigenous Australians. The centre aims to achieve cost-effective restoration solutions that grow and strengthen Indigenous enterprises, expand and bolster diverse training pathways, and conduct innovative research to support the advancement of a diversified Indigenous-led Restoration Economy. Healing Country will fuse Indigenous culture ....ARC Training Centre for Healing Country. Healing Country aims to be a world-first on-country capability, employment and business development training centre for Indigenous Australians. The centre aims to achieve cost-effective restoration solutions that grow and strengthen Indigenous enterprises, expand and bolster diverse training pathways, and conduct innovative research to support the advancement of a diversified Indigenous-led Restoration Economy. Healing Country will fuse Indigenous culture in a cooperative vision where science and traditional approaches to land management and rehabilitation will create and nourish an economy that supports healthy land and transform Indigenous restoration businesses into a major employer of on-country regional jobs.Read moreRead less
Assessing the viability of ecosystem processes in habitat fragments: lessons from land-clearing in the tropical savannas. Climate change and land degradation in southern Australia is increasing the demand for agricultural land in northern Australia. Broad scale land-clearing is prohibited in all Australian jurisdictions apart from the Northern Territory. However, our understanding of the impact of fragmentation on ecosystems processes in tropical savannas is poor. This research will set new stan ....Assessing the viability of ecosystem processes in habitat fragments: lessons from land-clearing in the tropical savannas. Climate change and land degradation in southern Australia is increasing the demand for agricultural land in northern Australia. Broad scale land-clearing is prohibited in all Australian jurisdictions apart from the Northern Territory. However, our understanding of the impact of fragmentation on ecosystems processes in tropical savannas is poor. This research will set new standards in pursuit of sustainability and conservation objectives within a regional planning context for northern Australian landscapes. We aim to contribute to a sustainability framework and integrated planning process for tropical savannas, so that it reaches its agricultural potential in a sustainable way, while maintaining the area's natural systems and biodiversity.Read moreRead less
Novel approaches to ecologically sustainable and safe rehabilitation of gold mine tailings. Gold is a major export commodity for Australia and the gold mining industry provides employment and infrastructure for rural Australian communities. However, gold is often found in arsenopyrite rich ore bodies which, after the extraction process, have the potential to release toxic quantities of arsenic into the environment. The University of Melbourne, Stawell Gold Mines P/L. and Native Seeds P/L. are co ....Novel approaches to ecologically sustainable and safe rehabilitation of gold mine tailings. Gold is a major export commodity for Australia and the gold mining industry provides employment and infrastructure for rural Australian communities. However, gold is often found in arsenopyrite rich ore bodies which, after the extraction process, have the potential to release toxic quantities of arsenic into the environment. The University of Melbourne, Stawell Gold Mines P/L. and Native Seeds P/L. are collaborating to ensure the rehabilitation of arseniferous wastes is environmentally safe and sustainable. Research will investigate the selection of plant species, factors affecting plant survival, plant uptake of arsenic and prevention of excess movement of arsenic into the food-chain.Read moreRead less