News

We aren’t all equal when it comes to climate vulnerability

February 22, 2024

By Dr Ang Li Published on February 22, 2024 It feels like Australia is in a never-ending cycle of climate-related disasters. In December 2023 alone we saw flooding inundate Northern Queensland, bushfires blaze through north-west New South Wales, and forecasts of thunderstorms and bushfires put South Australian residents on alert. Extreme weather and climate events are becoming more frequent and intense in Australia. So much so that in 2020 Australia was in the top ten regions globally for economic losses resulting from climate-related disasters.

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Too many Aussies are starting a family and raising their kids in poverty

February 21, 2024

By Dr Ana Gamarra Rondinel Published on February 21, 2024 Australia is a high-income country with universal health, education and social services. But, like many countries around the world, Australia is in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis. In fact, at least one in three families with children experience deprivation, missing out on essential items like food, stable housing and healthcare. And this is something that’s more pronounced for families with children under five years of age.

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Reptiles are helping us better understand threats to Australia’s biodiversity

February 20, 2024

By Dr Sarah Mulhall Published on February 20, 2024 It’s an early morning in January and we’re walking through a patch of native heathy woodland in southwest Victoria, a few kilometres west of the town of Casterton, known as the birthplace of the kelpie. Due to some recent planned burning, the scattered eucalypts provide little shade, and we have arrived just in time to see the spectacular grasstrees in bloom, with their tall, spear-like flower spikes.

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Fighting to save our Aussie bees – one bee hotel at a time

February 16, 2024

By Clancy Lester Published on February 16, 2024 I’m a 22-year-old ecologist from Yorta Yorta land in northern Victoria. I have a passion for native bees and my work aims to help bees in their urgent need for conservation. I’m researching native stingless bees in the Barrkira Aboriginal Homelands of northeast Arnhem Land, as part of my Master of Science (BioScience). This research is conducted by, with and for the Yolŋu First Nations people, who are concerned about recent observed declines in traditional honey (guku) harvests.

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Australia’s young people are getting lonelier

February 12, 2024

By Dr Ferdi Botha Published on February 12, 2024 If you ask most people who they think is most likely to experience loneliness, they will probably describe someone in their later years – perhaps a widowed pensioner or an elderly person with health issues who lives alone. Twenty years or so ago, this was pretty much the case. Between 2001 and 2009, the greatest proportion of lonely people in Australia were aged 65 and older.

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