Standard Presentation Australian Marine Sciences Association Annual Meeting 2023

Reef Integrated Monitoring and Report Program (RIMReP) – Traditional Owner Engagement (#166)

Asheley Ings 1 , Chloe Schauble 1 , Christine Grant 2 , Jim Davis 2 , Leah Talbot 2 , Charles David 2
  1. Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, Townsville, QLD, Australia
  2. Reef Integrated Monitoring and Reporting Program (RIMReP), RIMReP Traditional Owner Governance Member, Townsville, Qld, Australia

The Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area is both a natural and cultural landscape. Its Traditional Owners are the first custodians of the land and sea and have been using Indigenous science and monitoring methods for tens of thousands of years. Sharing knowledge and skills in mutually beneficial and culturally appropriate ways with Reef Traditional Owners is critical to the success of holistic monitoring and reporting. The Reef 2050 Integrated Monitoring and Reporting Program (RIMReP) is the key program to deliver this. The RIMReP vision is to develop an online knowledge system that enables resilience-based management of the Great Barrier Reef and provides managers with a comprehensive understanding of the progress to the Reef 2050 Plan. There are four Traditional Owner members of the RIMReP’s governance groups (operational and executive). In this presentation they provide an overview of what RIMReP is and how it will benefit the Traditional Owners. They outline the Traditional Owner engagement journey to date and proposed future engagement. This will include how to work with communities interested in contributing information to RIMReP and showcasing existing frameworks already working for Indigenous cultural heritage monitoring to occur appropriately and confidently through integration within RIMReP.