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Tuesday, 8 March 2016

There is something pretty special about the Australian landscape; its unique and rugged beauty having inspired countless poems, songs and films. For UWA’s Professor Michael Douglas, it has inspired close to a lifetime’s dedication to understanding this ‘sunburnt country’.

Michael recently joined the School of Earth and Environment to head up the Northern Australian Environmental Resources Hub – a $24 million research program funded by the Department of the Environment and one of six hubs making up the National Environmental Science Programme .

A collaboration of nine different organisations from across Australia, the Hub’s aim is to support the sustainable development across Northern Australia, from Broome right across to Cairns, but with a big focus on the Kimberley.

“There is a growing interest in making Northern Australia a ‘food bowl’, so it’s important for us to minimise the environmental impact of more intensive development, such as irrigated agriculture, across the north,” he explained.

“We need to look at the potential consequences and balance the needs of the environment with the interest of increasing production from these landscapes so we are clear what the trade offs are and what the future might look like.”

The Hub will also look at how to best maintain indigenous cultural values to protect the heritage of these regions as well as researching some of the big threats to Northern Australia, such as weeds, feral animals and changes in fire regimes.

This part of the world is not new to Michael, having spent over twenty years at Charles Darwin University  - the last five leading the National Environmental Research Program Northern Australia Hub and before that the Tropical Rivers and Coastal Knowledge Hub for four years.

“I moved from Melbourne to Darwin to do two years of fieldwork in Kakadu National Park for my PhD at Monash University, then I landed a job at Charles Darwin University and ended up staying for 25 years! I really enjoyed my time there but I am also looking forward to collaborating with the large pool of researchers with shared interests that UWA offers,” he said.

Michael maintains strong ties to Kakadu as Chair of the Research Committee and Nature Conservation Representative on the National Park’s Board of Management.

“Kakadu National Park would have to be my favourite place in Australia so it is wonderful to be able to help guide the joint management of the park with the Indigenous owners of Kakadu,” he said.

Of course, it hasn’t always been academia for Michael. In between his undergraduate degree and PhD he worked as a researcher and then producer for ABC TV making nature documentaries.

“That was my first encounter with Northern Australia. It was a great way to see the whole country but the highlight was definitely camping out in the Kimberley for a month, just remote from everything, filming wildlife – that was really special,” he said.

“It was an amazing opportunity to work with some truly fantastic Australian filmmakers as well as meet so many scientists and researchers studying an incredibly diverse range of plants and animals. I do think my name caused some confusion however, particularly when I left messages for people saying ‘Michael Douglas wants to talk to you about making a film’,” he laughed.

These are not the only comments he gets about his name, something he is asked about regularly.

“I like to say I am ‘a’ Michael Douglas, not ‘the’ Michael Douglas. I do get asked about it a fair bit, four times already today in fact! I did get a break though when I first got to Charles Darwin University as there was already a Paul Newman as the Head of IT and Joan Crawford as Head of HR,” he said.

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