Creating Scientific Info for Environmental Decision-Making thru Modelling

The study addresses the question of how to provide meaningful scientific information to support decision-making at a regional scale. The researchers studied the networks of marine parks in Kimberly regions of Western Australia (WA), where environmental sustainability is affected by the slow effects of climate change and one-off investments in infrastructure impact the region for decades to come.

Coupled marine and terrestrial models project the Kimberly marine system to 2050. They show that climate change, more than economic development, is the most significant factor affecting the future of marine ecosystems in the Kimberly region, with site-attached reef fish at greatest risk.

The Kimberly regions of WA consist of 420 thousand sq. km of land and marine waters. They are known for their remoteness, physical beauty, diverse ecosystems and biodata, and rich Aboriginal history.

The area possesses considerable natural resources, food production from agriculture, fishing, and aquaculture, and the growing tourism industry.

Both state and regional governments want to protect population growth, economic activity, natural resources, and cultural heritage for the future. Zoning was used on land and marine areas to support coastal planning and reserve management.

The study identified three challenges to coastal planning and research management:

1. Economic development in a sparsely populated area where a permanent nature of one-off large infrastructure investment can hinder adaptive management and beyond the control of local management authorities;  
2. Marine Protected Areas (MPA) which are subject to the complex political process;
3. and thirdly, the slow onset of climate change can affect the generation of feedback for adaptive management.  

Management of the Kimberly marine environments and its network of marine parks will need to address issues both under the control of their local management authorities and those beyond their control.

Those beyond their control are not suitable for adaptive management, so the approach is borrowed from the Future Studies and Foresight literature, which complements the traditional approach.

Adaptive management and future studies have complementary roles in conservation problems. Adaptive management allows adjustments and improvements to management. Future studies enable decision-makers to imagine and assess the long-term consequences of decisions that are hard to reverse or processes beyond control.

The project’s stakeholders identified climate change and population growth as the two factors that greatly impact the region’s future.

The study explored the intensities of these two factors, resulting in 18 scenarios with varying levels of climate change, development, dryness, and precipitations that capture uncertainties in predicted precipitation regimes.

Then, the study asked stakeholders for a set of management strategies that could help them achieve their goals of environmental sustainability, economic growth, and resilience to climate change.

Finally, computer modelling was used to explore the dynamics of biophysical and socio-economic processes under these scenarios and management strategies for future projections of the Kimberly marine system to the year 2050.