Because Australia is an island continent, our national security depends on maintaining our maritime borders, and our valuable primary export income relies on the marine estate, through both shipping routes and Australia’s extensive port network.
By Oceans Policy Science Advisory Group
Government of Australia
By 2025, the
combined value of Australian marine industries — both existing and emerging—
and ecosystem services is projected to be more than $100 billion per
annum. In support of Australia’s burgeoning ‘blue economy’, it is clearly in
our national interest to ensure that the economic, ecosystem and cultural
resources of the marine estate are well known, wisely used and carefully
managed. This task can only be achieved with increased focus on marine science
to inform industry development, policy and management. The world is facing
significant challenges to sustainable economic development. These challenges
include the effects of climate change, food and energy security, biodiversity
conservation, management of marine resources, resilience in the face of marine
disasters, and issues with sovereignty and security.
Despite relative
economic and social security and good environmental management, Australia is
also vulnerable to these challenges. Many answers to global challenges lie in
the sustainable use and management of the marine environment — by developing a
blue economy. A blue economy is one in which our ocean ecosystems bring
economic and social benefits that are efficient, equitable and sustainable.
Used wisely, Australia’s ocean resources can generate wealth, food, energy and
sustainable livelihoods for generations. Australia claims the third largest
marine jurisdiction of any nation on Earth—13.86 million km2 (check the map below)—more than double the size of its land mass.
Map Attribute: Australia's Maritime Jurisdiction
Because Australia is an island continent, our national security depends on maintaining our maritime borders, and our valuable primary export income relies on the marine estate, through both shipping routes and Australia’s extensive port network. The marine estate is also becoming increasingly important strategically as the gateway to East and South-east Asia. Australia derives substantial benefits from the oceans that are not easily quantifiable in market terms. The value of these ‘ecosystem services’ has been estimated at over $25 billion and growing. They include regulating carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by ocean absorption, recycling essential nutrients and controlling pests and diseases as well as social and cultural benefits including sport and recreation, and inspiration for art, design and education.
In 2009 Australia’s Oceans Policy Science Advisory Group (OPSAG) released a strategic National Framework for Marine Research and Innovation, A Marine Nation. The framework highlighted the significant economic, social and environmental value of Australia’s marine estate and the opportunities for research and innovation to support industry development and government policy development and regulation. A Marine Nation aimed to support Australia’s quest to maximize wealth generation from marine assets while maintaining the health of the marine environment for future generations. It guided strategic planning and investment in national marine research and research capability, as evidenced by investment in a Marine and Climate Super Science Initiative in 2009. Through broad consultation with science providers and users, A Marine Nation ensured that investment was well connected to, and thus likely to have positive impact on, both government and private industry stakeholders. The concepts and recommendations within the document gained widespread community and political support.
Australia has sovereign rights
over much this vast area of ocean, along with the fishery, mineral, and
petroleum resources found within it. The marine estate is growing rapidly in
value as a vital national asset as our population continues to grow and
offshore oil and gas resources are developed. Activity continues to increase
along the coastal fringe and new bulk commodity ports are servicing expanding
resource-based export industries. The national value of production across
marine-based industries (e.g. oil and gas exploration and extraction, tourism,
fishing, boat-building, shipping, ports) was $42.3 billion in 2009–10 (compared
with $39.6 billion from agriculture), a major contribution to Gross Domestic
Product, employment and infrastructure at national, state/territory and
regional levels.
The protection
and security of national sovereignty, for both Australia’s territory and
people, and the safety of the population are essential responsibilities for the
government. These responsibilities support our national values and the
advancement of the social, environmental and economic well-being of our nation.
Maritime
sovereignty, security and safety are particularly important for Australia
because of our economic reliance on the oceans for transport, trade, energy,
international communication and food. We are separated from our neighbours by
oceans, and rely on good order at sea to promote peaceful and prosperous relations.
Our national interests need to be protected against maritime security threats
that include the illegal exploitation of natural resources, illegal activity in
protected areas, maritime terrorism, piracy, robbery or violence at sea, and
compromise to bio-security and marine pollution. Substantial growth in oil and
gas developments and shipping of resources has meant that our ability to
protect the much expanded ports, shipping and offshore infrastructure from
attack such as terrorism is vital to our economy. There will also be greater
risk of oil spills requiring improved management to minimize impacts on
biodiversity. Adapting to a changing climate will place greater demand for
assessment of risks in the protection of assets, the safety of maritime operations
and occurrence of natural hazards to allow adequate preparedness.
The physical
environment of our EEZ is extraordinarily complex. It ranges from tropical seas
with strong tidal flows, cyclones and areas where breaking internal waves belie
a smooth sea surface, to the huge swells and storms of the wild Southern Ocean.
To facilitate safe navigation for maritime trade routes, manage commercial
fisheries and to undertake patrols, rescues and Defence activities successfully
in these waters, it is necessary to understand and predict the waves, current
systems, tides and other oceanographic phenomena. Accurate hydro-graphic data
and charts are essential for safety of navigation for maritime trade and
recreational users alike. They are also crucial for defining changing maritime
boundaries of legislative jurisdictions and assist in substantiating our
sovereign claims. Hydrography also assists in the exploration and management of
sea floor resource exploitation and responses to natural or human disasters.
However, significant parts of Australia’s marine jurisdiction are not
adequately charted.
The impact of
extreme events, such as tsunamis, cyclones and severe storms, on communities
and infrastructure is a significant issue for Australia’s maritime security.To improve our ability to predict the impact and risk of these and other
marine natural hazards, and better plan for emergency response, fine-scale coastal
bathymetric and oceanographic data and advanced risk-based modeling approaches are needed.
Safety of life
at sea also depends on reliable predictions about the behavior of the marine
environment. Maritime incidents caused by a lack of appropriate information can
be potentially catastrophic in terms of loss of human life, economic impact,
degradation of the environment and the maintenance of safe navigation.
Crucially, surveillance and security activities require legally robust data to
support prevention and compliance activities and enhanced operational forecasts
for the ocean, atmospheric and geo-hazard domains. Limited blue water and
tsunami forecasting capacities exist for the open ocean and to some extent near
shore, but long term commitment is required to develop a national operational
oceanographic and geo-hazard forecasting capability with an enhanced coastal
component.
To provide real benefit to the Australian community, these
operational forecasting systems will need to focus on achieving true
forecasting skill at fine spatial and temporal scales, predict seabed and
shoreline conditions and be able to provide a clear indication of the
reliability of the forecast. These aspirations will need to be supported by a
wide range of observations, collected both remotely and in situ, to feed into
forecasting and compliance systems. Future sensors collecting these
observations will need to be able to adjust to the limitations of environmental
conditions such as turbidity, waves and other effects caused by the weather.
Methods used to analyze the data, integrate and calculate the forecasts will
also need to improve. As we acquire ocean data at finer scales and in real (or
near real) time, the demand for efficient and inter-operable data systems will
become critical. National ocean observation and data systems will provide
rapid, more accurate and accessible forecasts of Australian ocean and geo-hazard
conditions, potentially saving lives, averting major incidents, reducing
industry operating costs and improving the efficiency of our Defence and other
compliance forces and enhancing our ability to predict the impact and risk of
marine natural hazards.
To meet the challenges ahead, Australia needs to invest in the three traditional pillars of
science: observation, experimentation and modeling. Infrastructure is required
for all these steps in the science process, ranging from observing
technologies, through platforms such as research vessels, sustained observing
systems, and experimental infrastructure, to data management, storage,
manipulation and visualization technologies. A stable, sustained and
predictable commitment to maintaining, updating and transforming
infrastructure, and the human resources to run it, is critical to ensure the
initial investment in new infrastructure delivers long-term and sustainable
benefits. Investment in human capability is also required: training, skills
development, mechanisms and incentives for collaboration. Finally, investment
in science communication is needed to improve application and acceptance of
science in policy, legislation and regulation. This will require communication
of the relevance and need for marine science and the benefits gained from
previous and ongoing investment in this element of the national innovation
sector.
Publication Details:
This an abridged article derived from Marine Nation 2025 report prepared by the
Oceans Policy Science Advisory Group, Government of Australia, published under a Creative
Commons Attribution 3.0 Australia license. The details of the relevant license conditions are available on the Creative Commons website at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/au/deed.en.
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