Three Griffith University researchers among the 72 new Linkage Projects awarded by the Australian Research Council.
Professor Michele Burford, Dr Fernando Martinez Coma and Dr Tanja Beer will lead their respective projects valued at more than $1.5 million collectively, which will support long term strategic research partnerships between researchers and industry.
Professor Burford’s project ‘The key to the long-term health of Australian rivers’ will tackle the challenging issue of predicting the ability of rivers to process anthropogenic nutrients; Dr Martinez Coma’s project ‘Reducing the Informal Vote in Queensland Elections’ will explore the issue of hundreds of thousands of wasted votes at every Queensland election; and Dr Beer’s project ‘Culture for Climate: the performing arts and eco-creative sustainability’ aims to fill an urgent knowledge gap that is stalling the transition of Australia’s performing arts to environmental sustainability.
Professor Burford said while water quality was deteriorating in many of Australia’s rivers, including algal blooms and low oxygen events, the cost of restoring catchments was prohibitively expensive.
“It is also difficult to get investment when there are significant knowledge gaps related to the fate of pollutants, such as nutrients. Our project brings together industry and government to provide important new information on what happens to catchment nutrients in rivers to improve management and prediction of the benefits of restoration.”
Dr Beer echoed her delight that culture and sustainability leadership in Australia had been given the ‘green light for a multiyear Linkage Project through the Australian Research Council.
“Over the next three years the Performance + Ecology Research Lab (P+ERL) at Griffith University will explore eco-creative sustainability strategies to accelerate meaningful action on climate in and through the arts. This project will be developed with Performing Arts Centres Australia (PAC) and One Stone Consulting alongside leading cultural collaborators.
“Our project will be the first of its kind to develop innovative sustainability practices and policies that unlock and empower new ways of thinking and creating in a climate changed world. It marks a significant step towards climate justice for the Australian performing arts sector and the cultural sector at large.
“The highly competitive ARC Linkage Program promotes national and international research partnerships between researchers and business, industry and community organisations. In this round, only 26% of all applications submitted were funded, and only one in the Creative Arts in the whole of the country.”
Author
