A new era of marine biotope mapping and monitoring is required to deal with the biodiversity management and research objectives of the 21st Century and the high volumes of imagery and data generated by modern methods. The requirements for spatial management, monitoring of biodiversity, community states and health, ecosystem services and application of environmental accounting have evolved in recent years. To meet these needs, classification schema are required that unify the processes of setting ecological information needs, data collection, processing pipelines and mapping. Concurrent developments in the area of underwater robotics, that have facilitated increased efficiency of data collection at higher resolution and over larger areas, need to dovetail into such schema if those efficiencies in data collection are to translate to efficient ecological interpretation and decision-making. One scheme recently developed is the Combined Biotope Classification Scheme designed to provide such unification and be applicable to all marine habitats. This symposium aims to bring workers in marine classification systems together to present recent advances and explore the implications and benefits of various classification schema and biotope assessment approaches.
Symposium led by
Matt Edmunds
Australian Marine Ecology
Adrian Flynn
Fathom Pacific
Lawrance Ferns
Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, Victoria
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