Sustainable environmental stewardship requires understanding of: (i) how social-ecological systems are being affected by key pressures; (ii) the state and trend of key components of the systems; and (iii) the effectiveness of current management approaches. In Australia, the State of the Environment report (SoE) – which, as a legislative requirement of the EPBC Act is tabled in Parliament every 5 years – is intended to provide an authoritative overview of how Australia’s environment is faring and the areas of greatest need, to guide environmental stewardship.
This presentation, from the authors of the marine chapter the 2021 State of the Environment report, provides a synopsis of the approach used to produce the chapter and of the key findings and take-home messages. We highlight how the approach has evolved from previous SoEs – most notably in the first attempt at including Indigenous knowledge alongside western science in the chapter – and consider the needs for addressing shortcomings of the approach going forward.