USQ postgrad to talk at BirdLife International World Conservation Conference

USQ PhD student and Australian Centre for Sustainable Catchments (ACSC) researcher Simon Attwood has been invited to give two presentations at an international conservation conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina this month.

Simon will travel to the BirdLife World Conservation Conference along with delegates from more than a hundred countries to discuss a variety of current environmental issues, ranging from species extinctions on islands to conservation on the high seas, and including a wide-ranging discussion of responses to the climate change crisis.

ACSC Deputy Director, Dr Jerry Maroulis, said it is very significant for a postgraduate student to have such involvement on the world stage.

'One of Simon's presentations discusses the management of wildlife populations in European agricultural landscapes, the use of incentive schemes to promote biodiversity conservation, and the potential transferability of these strategies to regions with a relatively recent agricultural history (such as Australia),' Dr Maroulis said.

'This talk summarises a paper that Simon has recently co-authored with ACSC colleagues Kathryn Reardon-Smith and Dr Geoff Cockfield and representatives from CSIRO, UQ and other institutions.

'Simon's other presentation will examine the potential role of the creative arts in communicating conservation issues to new audiences. The arts world has been exploring this for many years, but it is relatively new from an ecological science perspective. With concern surrounding a growing sense of ‘nature-deficit disorder' in young people, particularly in our growing urban populations, this kind of approach could prove to be a valuable contribution to developing communication strategies and tools.

'Simon's talk focuses on the birds used in the music of the composer Olivier Messiaen and builds upon a presentation he gave earlier in the year at USQ's International Conference of Messiaen Studies.

'The BirdLife workshop, which aims to develop strategies to further an alliance of the conservation movement and the arts, will be chaired by the Booker Prize winning Canadian author Margaret Atwood, who is joint honorary president of BirdLife International's Rare Bird Club.'

The conference will be attended by around 500 delegates from BirdLife International's global Partnership, including Birds Australia. BirdLife is a global network of conservation organisations that strive to conserve birds, their habitats and global biodiversity, and works with people towards sustainability in the use of natural resources. 

Media Contact: USQ Media, Connie-Louise Rego +61 7 4631 2977