Monitoring, Evaluation, Research and Information Management

In 2011 WGAC established the Uunguu Monitoring and Evaluation Committee [UMEC] to check on the Healthy Country Plan progress and provide expert advice to the Healthy Country Team. The committee is made up of Traditional Owners and five independent scientists from relevant disciplines. UMEC provides an annual Healthy Country progress report to Wunambal Gaambera people. An independent audit of our healthy Country Program in 2015 recognised that WGAC was well advanced in its monitoring and evaluation work and that the UMEC had been an effective vehicle for this (Austin et al. 2017).

Our monitoring program incorporates both traditional knowledge and western science. For example, we have cultural indicators of the health of important animals, such as animals being fat in their right season. We also use western science measures of species abundance, like using boat-based counts for marine turtles.