The Western Australian Marine Science Institution has posted more than 130 data records making it the fourth biggest contributor to the WA Government’s open data portal.

The records span 12 years of research covering the Kimberley marine environment, Ningaloo, dredging science, climate change, fisheries, marine ecosystems and oceanography. 

The Western Australian Marine Science Institution (WAMSI) Data Manager Luke Edwards said the collection maximises the State Government’s investment in marine science and makes a significant contribution to information gathered about the Western Australian marine environment.

“Having WAMSI data available via the State Government Open Data portal, along with the Australian Ocean Data Network (AODN), makes sense as it increases its discoverability and therefore opportunities for various parties to reuse the data,” Mr Edwards said. “More data will become accessible after embargo periods for some WAMSI projects are lifted in 2019.”

WAMSI CEO Dr Luke Twomey said data consolidation, synthesis and access had been identified among the top priorities for marine science in WAMSI’s  Blueprint for Marine Science 2050.

“WAMSI is looking at how to remove the barriers to enable greater marine data sharing,” Dr Twomey said. “By understanding the value of the data we can work to convince users to move toward the standardisation and interoperability that is essential for the data economy.

“We’ve made some good progress so far and there is definitely an appetite for it amongst the users, but we have a long way to go,” Dr Twomey said. “This is a huge task and at some stage the marine science collective is going to have to address the elephant in the room.”

To browse the available WAMSI records visit –https://catalogue.data.wa.gov.au/organization/western-australian-marine-science-institution. 

If you have questions please contact Luke Edwards (luke.edwards@pawsey.org.au)