TRaCK synthesis year
| Objective: | The project will target the adoption by water planners and managers of the results of TRaCK and other water research. |
| Funding: | Commission funding of $1.77m plus applicable GST and $1,565,544 of in-kind contributions from the TRaCK consortium. |
| Jurisdiction: | Multijurisdictional across northern Australia |
| Commencing: | February 2011 |
| Completion: | March 2012 |
About the project
TRaCK (Tropical Rivers and Coastal Knowledge) is a research hub under the Commonwealth Environmental Research Facilities scheme, managed by the Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population, the Arts and Communities.
TRaCK draws together more than 70 of Australia's leading social, cultural, environmental and economic researchers. Its research focuses on the tropical north of Australia from Cape York to Broome.
At a time of increasing awareness of the value of water across Australia, it is vital that public debate, policy and management decisions about our tropical rivers and estuaries are informed by sound science.
TRaCK is providing the science and knowledge that governments, communities and industries need for the sustainable use and management of Australia's tropical rivers and estuaries.
Its work thus far has focused on acquiring fundamental knowledge about the assets and values of tropical rivers and their underpinning ecosystems.
Many research activities in northern Australia undertaken by TRaCK and other parties are now complete and much of the remaining activity will be complete by mid 2011.
Collectively, these initiatives have generated a range of new information and tools that will be critical for the evidence-based management of water resources in northern Australia.
The project will value add to past investments by synthesising the information from across these various initiatives around key management issues and products. The project will also undertake appropriate adoption activities to ensure a high level of end-user uptake.
Project benefits
The project will result in the following tools:
- an interactive web-based classification tool for the TRaCK Digital Atlas
- decision support tools for tropical river catchments
- environmental flows tools for the wet dry tropics
It will promote Indigenous enterprises and water planning and Indigenous enagement in water research and assist to monitor river health in the wet dry tropics.