Biodiversity models in Australian environmental policy, regulation, planning and management – a short history and opportunities for urgently needed impact.

Australia is a land of contradictions. A mega-diverse nation with a unique biodiversity legacy of millions of years of continental isolation and tens of thousands of years of Indigenous land stewardship. Most Australian birds and plants, and more than 90% of Australia’s mammals, reptiles, and amphibians are endemic to Australia and therefore globally unique.  But since British colonisation just 250 years ago, Australia has suffered the highest rate of modern biodiversity loss of any developed nation, due largely to dramatic land use change involving continental-scale destruction of habitats, and the subsequent introduction of invasive and highly damaging species. Australia’s unique ecology and pressing modern biodiversity crisis has led to the development of novel, often cutting-edge applications of model-based decision support tools, including spatial population dynamics models, species distribution models, mechanistic niche and micro-climate models, ecological state-and-transition models, spatial prioritisation and other decision theory models to support policy, management, planning, monitoring design and optimal allocation of scarce conservation funding. I will provide an overview of the use of biodiversity models in Australian policy design and evaluation, regulation, urban planning, reserve design, national and global biodiversity reporting, and legal challenges. While many examples exist of the constructive application of biodiversity models in real-world, often high-stakes decisions, the reality is that the Australian biodiversity crisis is accelerating, propelled by climate change and ongoing land-use pressures. A new way of using models to mobilise public sentiment and design systemic change is urgently needed. I will discuss the need and opportunity for biodiversity modellers to work as part of interdisciplinary teams to bring greater positive impact to the benefit of society and biodiversity. New ways of constructing and communicating socio-ecological models are needed to motivate, understand, predict and evaluate societal transitions, and map plausible pathways toward global goals for biodiversity, climate, and people. With globally significant biodiversity to protect and restore and pressing climate, land-use and social polarisation challenges, Australia needs innovation in applied biodiversity modelling and decision support, and new cohort of biodiversity modellers to rise to the challenge.