Digiscape farmer interviews. Information delivery. ⢠Map based. ⢠Bar charts. ⢠Colour coding. Digiscape | Tony We
“Project 25” –farmers, water quality and onfarm decision-making. Aaron Davis Centre for Tropical Water & Aquatic Ecosystem Research (TropWATER) Catchment to Reef Research Group, James Cook University
Farmer-landholder perceptions of water quality issues and management policies?
Global context of landholder attitudes; • skepticism that water pollution problems even exist? • frequent aversion to responsibility for creating water pollution problems? • lack of faith in scientific information collected by external agencies? • absence of local data directly relevant to their farming activities?
Water quality extension and promoting practice change?
• willingness to implement practice change appears directly related to perceived seriousness of the pollution problem • respond to pollutants ‘they can see’! • soil erosion control measures typically gain greater traction that nutrient control • more ‘invisible’ forms of pollution (nitrogen or phosphorus losses) remain a challenge! • ‘prove it’s my molecule of nitrogen’?
NESP Tropical Water Quality Hub ‘innovative research for practical solutions to maintain and improve tropical water quality from catchment to coast’
24 projects announced at initial hub launch• • • •
Lack of local water quality information Real data on industry contributions to GBR water quality issues? reliability of modelling? disconnection from information
Project 25: Locally relevant WQ monitoring! -Science communication (monitoring WQ in a way more meaningful to industry)?
Project Design and Management
Aims • Grower-driven project • Grower input on site selection • Relative contribution of sugarcane to EOC catchment water quality? • Industry clearly wants ‘real’, locally relevant data?
Rainforest
Urban, mixed land-use
Cane, bananas
Water quality sampling-data collection • • • • •
Combination of the old and the new! Manual ‘grab’ samples for laboratory analysis Continuous ‘real time’ monitoring Nitrate sensing probes for ‘real-time’ water quality data (no laboratory required)
Date
1/24/2017
1/24/2017
1/18/2017
1/12/2017
1/5/2016
12/30/2016
12/24/2016
12/17/2016
6 350
5 300
4 200
3 150
2 100
1 50
0 0
Nitrate- (mg/L)
Stream Height (m)
12/11/2016
11/24/2016
11/18/2016
11/11/2016
11/5/2016
10/30/2016
10/24/2016
10/17/2016
10/11/2016
10/5/2016
9/29/2016
9/22/2016
9/16/2016
9/10/2016
9/4/2016
8/28/2016
8/22/2016
8/16/2016
8/10/2016
8/3/2016
7/28/2016
Stream Height (m)
Value of locally tailored water quality data
Nitrate (mg/L)
250
Loads? • Kilograms (kg), total loads or per hectare? • Natural ‘background’ contribution + ‘anthropogenic’ (man-made) contribution
• Basis of ‘Reef Plan’ targets • Basis of Source catchments modelling
Program design: Water Quality changes through catchment?
Dissolved Inorganic Nitrogen (DIN) load exports in a Project 25 catchment Downstream changes in water quality Downstream changes in water quality
‘Anthropogenic’
‘Natural’
‘Natural’
‘Pristine Rainforest’
• • • • •
‘Intensive Agriculture’
Relatively pristine upper catchments, developed downstream Anthropogenic load increases through catchment? Anthropogenic fraction (36761 kg load) 4068 hectares of intensive agriculture upstream DIN Yield of ~9 kg/Ha from intensive agriculture for 2016-17 wet season
Overall Project 25 progress: • 1+ year of data, 2nd wet season underway Emphasis on communication-collaboration • • • • • • •
Maintaining grower ownership with scientific rigor Meaningful grower role in program design Establishing trust early! ‘Get some runs on the board’ Broad range of stakeholders (avoid being too broad)? Data handling and communication (good and bad news?) Data embargoes-public access to data?
Overall Project 25 progress: Lots of communication effort; •
Youtube vignettes, radio and TV segments
•
Cane Industry media coverage (magazines etc.)
•
Local ‘shed meetings’, extension collaborations (QDAF)
•
Future effort in local targeting communications within sub-catchments
Project 25 development and future: •
Business as usual with WQ data collection
•
More sampling sites (finer scales moving ‘up-catchments’, hotspot focus)
•
More targeted extension, benchmarking of practices
•
How to extend the Project 25 model (transferability, scalability to other scenarios?)
•
Increasing emphasis on how we might embed local water quality information into decision-making framework for industry (locally and more broadly)?
•
CSIRO-Digiscapes (RTWQM, user experiences, precision agriculture)
Digiscapes One of CSIRO’s ‘big six’ Future Science Platforms (FSPs) which will underpin innovation in health and biology, resources, agriculture and manufacturing
‘Helping agricultural industries to be more productive and providing more valuable knowledge to environmental policy makers through a new generation of decision tools. Using sensors, data visualisation, artificial intelligence and assisted decision making to generate timely and relevant advice and insights will allow better choices for more productive and sustainable outcomes.’ https://research.csiro.au/digiscape/
Digiscape: delivery of cropping-nitrogen-water quality information
Tony Webster, Peter Thorburn 7 July 2017 CSIRO AGRICULTURE AND FOOD
18 | Digiscape | Tony Webster
A multi-year vision Information • Sensors / monitoring o o o o
Water quality Farm management Climate Soil
• Remote / proximal sensing o Crop biomass o Crop nutrient status
• ‘Other’ projections o Weather forecast o Seasonal climate
19 | Digiscape | Tony Webster
Issues Outputs • Deliver water quality • What are farmers information • Linking water quality interested in? o Relevant with farm information on management water quality o User friendly • Forecasting o Weather &/or climate forecasting o Biomass
• Delivery to farmers o Visualisation
o Privacy
• Actors (other than farmers) o Canegrowers o Government o NRM boards
Digiscape farmer interviews Information delivery • Map based • Bar charts • Colour coding
20 | Digiscape | Tony Webster
Project 25 Summary • More than just a water quality monitoring program! • ‘bottom-up’ rather than ‘top-down’ monitoring and communication • Emphasis on framework development to embed WQ monitoring meaningfully in farmer decision making • Addressing the water quality communication challenges; - locally relevant data on agricultural impacts on water quality - Communicating data at appropriate spatial and temporal scales - ‘real-time’ or at least ‘in-time’ data for farm management - pollutants ‘they can see’, ‘prove it’s my molecule of nitrogen’ - providing management capacity
Acknowledgments •
NESP Tropical Water Quality Hub, RRRC
•
BBIFMAC
•
CANEGROWERS Ltd and canegrowers
•
DEHP, QDAF, DSITI Catchment Loads Monitoring team
•
CSIRO-Digiscapes
