Graduate Research in Environment (and Resource Management) - Overview

Graduate Research in Environment (and Resource Management) draws on the expertise of academics who are actively engaged in disciplinary, multi-disciplinary and inter-disciplinary research. This represents one of the largest concentrations of expertise devoted to the management, science and policy of environmental issues and resource use in Australia, with strong links to research and policy branches of the Commonwealth and State Governments, CSIRO, and community groups.

The Australian National University’s diverse strengths in environmental research are brought together by a number of key networks including the ANU-IE (ANU Institute for Environment), the ANU Water Initiative, the Economics and Environment Network, and the ANU Environmental History Network.

Broad research opportunities:

Conservation biology; corporate sustainability; ecological humanities; environmental and social impact assessment; environmental systems modelling; fire science; forestry in national development; greenhouse science; human ecology; land degradation; land and water management; landscape ecology; resource policy; sustainable agriculture; sustainable development; urban systems; and the social, political and economic aspects of environmental and resource management issues in the Asia-Pacific region.

Specialised research opportunities:

Agricultural meteorology; agro-ecology; agro-forestry; climatology; cross-cultural ecological knowledge and ethics; economics & environment; ecology of development; ecology of industrial society; ecophysiology; energy resources; environmental health, environmental history; environmental law, fire science; forest genetics; forest inventory; geographic information systems; geomorphology; hazard assessment; hydrogeology; hydrology; integrated catchment management; modelling; plant and animal ecology; remote sensing; resource economics; resource policy; rural land management; silviculture; soil science and soil conservation; water resources management; wildlife management; wood science and technology; relationships between the social, economic and ecological sustainability of extractive industry, with specific reference to large-scale investments in mining, petroleum, forestry and fisheries; interactions between human communities and ecosystems at different spatial and temporal scales; the institutional and ecological dynamics of landscape and catchment management practices and their contribution to sustainable rural livelihoods and the role of local indigenous knowledge in the practice of community-based resource management under different national policy frameworks and property regimes.

These research areas reflect the direct interests of staff whose expertise can be complemented through joint supervisory arrangements within the ANU, or with other institutions in Canberra such as CSIRO and various research and policy branches of the Commonwealth and State Governments. Many staff have extensive experience in the developing economies.