In 2015, three government agencies with legislative responsibility for managing the Great Barrier Reef agreed upon overarching goals for its continued health and management, documented as the Reef 2050 Long Term Sustainability Plan. Identification of gaps in data and information to know how we are progressing towards those goals has guided allocation of research funding from the Reef Trust Partnership for integrated monitoring and reporting.
This presentation describes the view at the interface of the Reef 2050 Plan, social science academic outputs, and their application in management activities. Many outputs on this topic describe the need to build a bridge between academia and management. What is less clearly articulated is the process of dedicating effort to crossing the bridge, transforming academic output to pragmatic management application.
In this presentation we share our experience of crossing the bridge, based on four years of intensive effort working on the human dimensions of the Reef 2050 Plan, to align social science research effort with management activities. We use case studies from the suite of management tools currently in use. The presentation concludes with future focussed questions about what social science research can contribute to achieving a positive future for Great Barrier Reef.