National Marine Science Committee – Marine science driving the blue economy

Marine science driving the development
of Australia's blue economy

A New Decade (2025-2035)

The National Marine Science Committee (NMSC) has begun a process to develop a new national decadal strategy for marine science, and an associated plan to deliver on this strategy. This Strategy and Plan will follow on from the 2015-2025 Plan and an update and assessment of progress in the NMSC Midway report.

NMSC has designed this process to ensure that “The Strategy” is focussed on coordinating and delivering high- quality marine science to support priorities identified by intergovernmental processes (e.g., UN Sustainable Development Goals, Ocean Decade; Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Conference of the Parties (COP), World Ocean Assessment (WOA),etc.), National and State governments (e.g., National Science and Research Priorities, Australia’s Sustainable Ocean Plan (SOP), etc.), industry peak bodies, NGOs, communities, and First Nations peoples.

This is a complex task, and we are counting on the broad science and end-user communities to collaboratively develop a strategy and plan we can collectively support.

Over the next months, we invite the marine science community and interested end-users to collaborate and contribute to the new National Marine Science Strategy (2025-2035) through:

Developing White Papers
focused on describing the science required to satisfy priority national end-user needs, and maximize societal benefits and the best means to deliver this science.

Information on the White Paper process

Explore the Final White Papers 2025–2035 — Now Available

Participating in the National Marine Science Symposium
in June 2025 to review the white papers and discuss priority recommendations for the NMSS (2025-2035).

Supporting the Official Launch
of the National Marine Science Strategy (NMSS) 2025-2035 at Parliament House, Canberra, in March 2026.

Developing the New National Marine Science Strategy (2025-2035)

In August 2024, NMSC leaders identified key Focal Areas to shape the new NMSS. These areas draw on national and international priorities, including the Sustainable Oceans Plan, the UN Ocean Decade, and the 2015 National Marine Science Plan review.

The Focus Areas are grouped into two themes: Challenges & Opportunities and Enablers.

Challenges and Opportunities
- Flipping the Tide: A First Nations vision for Indigenous leadership in sustainable ocean culture
- Australia’s changing oceans: Building knowledge for actionable outcomes
- Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health
- Towards A Sustainable Blue Economy for Australia
- Planning Urban and Coastal Development, Infrastructure, and Services
- Food Security
- Energy Security, Diversification, and achieving Net-Zero
- Maintaining Sovereignty, Securing, and Defending Australia
- Protecting Australia’s Underwater Cultural Heritage
- Marine Climate Interventions
- Integrated Ocean Management & Resource Allocation and Management
- Ocean Accounting
- Coastal and Marine Ecosystem Restoration and Repair

Enablers
- From Science to Sustainability: Advancing Ocean Literacy, Education, and Training
- National Marine Research Infrastructure: An Enabler for Australia's Sustainable Ocean Future
- Engineering, Prototyping, and Technology Development - Robotics, Autonomy, and Automation
- Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning for Australian Marine Science
- Data through to information
- Omics, Synthetic Biology, and Biotechnology in Australian Marine Science
- Modeling and Quantitative Science
- Social Science for Meeting Australia's Ocean Goals