Goal 14: Life Below Water

We are looking to investigate how we can achieve sustainable development in a coastal context particularly in the Illawarra and southern New South Wales and we're looking at the all the changes that have taken place along the coast in recent years and that will take place in the future 

so the blue economy is a concept that has been gaining a huge amount of traction overseas and here in Australia and there's some challenges associated with that in terms of how it might be impacting on questions of equity justice and incorporating community ideas and aspirations. So we think it's really important to me thinking from a community perspective about what the blue economy should look like.

So my part of the project is really about bringing in Indigenous perspectives across the whole research project to say what does it mean to aboriginal people and our values and where are we going with the economic development in the blue economy. For the Land Council being a partner of the University is important. We can show how we can lead together, the collaboration is something that will richen the experience for all. I think that bringing Aboriginal perspectives into the way research is undertaken by the university is going to add value back into that sphere but then to get access to the people with expertise in the blue economy is going to add value to our role as custodians of this land. 

So we have done network analysis in the past to look at how the innovators interact with each other, government and authorities. We’re gonna build on that to provide a platform for the innovators to the keep in touch better and to be more effective in bringing innovation. We are building sensors and a database to house the data, to bring much-needed water quality data so scattered at the minute and we’d like to make that publicly available more comprehensive. 

Well whenever you looking at coastal ocean problems you need to look at those problems from the perspective of a number of different disciplines. So we need to take into account the science view, the legal view, the social sciences and indeed the creative arts that interpret coastal and marine environments for the community at large. 

So an ideal world is one where we focus on common ideas. common goals and aspirations rather than areas of conflict and division, and we are really hoping that the blue futures model helps to focus how we can develop sustainable development opportunities in our oceans that provide for economic benefits but also for social equity, justice and environmental sustainability.