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This chapter explores how transformative sustainable pedagogies are being implemented in the Fashion Business School (FBS) at London College of Fashion, University of the Arts, London. Specifically, providing an understanding of how sustainability is embedded in the teaching and learning experience of fashion business students. Adopting Burns et al. Model of Sustainable Pedagogy (2019), this study takes a qualitative, multiple case study approach to showcase the transformative nature of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) initiatives in order to inform future thinking in teaching and learning practices for fashion sustainability education. Across the five case studies and the four dimensions of Burns et al. model, our findings reveal 14 common aspects that emphasise a shift and advancement towards ESD within the FBS, resulting in seven key positive student outcomes. Limitations include ESD definitions, data and metrics. The case studies were not designed in accordance with Burns et al. model, thus their alignment to and evaluation against it is restricted. As fashion business educators, the deployment of ESD transformation frameworks are urgent, imperative and beneficial for framing curriculum development and improving accountability and measurement responsibilities. The study makes a valuable contribution to the emergent field of ESD and transformative T&L. It is one of few studies focusing on fashion business and SD and the only known study to explore diverse ESD initiatives and approaches collectively within a HE fashion business context. It both challenges HEIs and offers areas for improvement towards transformative sustainable education in fashion.

The global ornamental trade network has facilitated the large-scale import of non-native freshwater fish into Australia, providing benefits to society through fishkeeping and to the economy through a rapidly growing domestic industry. However, subsequent introduction and establishments of ornamental species into freshwater ecosystems marks ornamental trade as a fundamental and mounting threat to the unique native freshwater ichthyofauna of Australia. This is particularly heightened in tropical regions of northern Australia where ongoing invasions of freshwater ornamental fish are projected to increase substantially due to favourable climate bands. A largely understudied industry provides the backdrop for these ornamental invasions, with limited information available on the freshwater ornamental fish involved, including hazardous and imperilled species, and the extent of illegal and unregulated trade within Australia. These critical knowledge gaps inhibit the development of effective and proactive strategies necessary to manage biosecurity threats from the ornamental industry in Australia, leading to potential impacts for unique native freshwater ichthyofauna. The aim of my research was to quantify the freshwater ornamental fish industry within Australia, providing foundational knowledge on multiple facets of the supply chain including the trade of hazardous, illegal, and imperilled species within regulated and unregulated sectors. Additionally, my research aims to evaluate and develop proactive management strategies to mitigate biosecurity threats from freshwater ornamental fish in trade. [...], Thesis (PhD Doctorate), Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), School of Environment and Sc, Science, Environment, Engineering and Technology, Full Text

Full Text, Thesis (PhD Doctorate), Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), School of Environment and Sc, Science, Environment, Engineering and Technology, Few areas on earth remain untouched by human activity. Agricultural land has become the largest terrestrial biome globally with ~ 40% of earth’s surface occupied by pastures and croplands. This has resulted in widespread biodiversity loss and ecosystem alteration, which is being further exacerbated by climate change. Urgent and widespread revegetation of agricultural landscapes is required to slow and remediate these impacts. Simultaneously, the extent of abandoned agricultural land, often referred to as old-fields, is increasing worldwide due to a range of socioeconomic factors, providing significant opportunities for revegetation. Natural regeneration, whereby an area is left to revegetate on its own, with minimal human intervention, can be a cost-effective and large-scale restoration approach well suited to some, but not all, agricultural landscapes. While there are numerous success stories regarding natural regeneration from around the world, natural regeneration in other areas is significantly constrained by low propagule supply and/or high levels of land degradation. Considerable knowledge gaps regarding patterns and drivers of natural regeneration remain and improved understanding of these processes is critical for informing improved decisions regarding effective revegetation strategies for degraded landscapes. This thesis examines natural regeneration of vegetation within agricultural landscapes, specifically of old-fields, with a focus on floodplains of the northern Murray-Darling Basin, Australia. More specifically, the research presented here sought to: 1) understand global trends of natural regeneration of woody vegetation in agricultural landscapes and its key drivers,; 2) describe patterns and drivers of natural regeneration within floodplain old-fields of the northern Murray-Darling Basin; 3) understand the regenerative capacity from major propagule sources within agricultural floodplain landscapes of the northern Murray-Darling Basin; and 4) investig

The relationship between detritivore diversity and decomposition can provide information on how biogeochemical cycles are affected by ongoing rates of extinction, but such evidence has come mostly from local studies and microcosm experiments. We conducted a globally distributed experiment (38 streams across 23 countries in 6 continents) using standardised methods to test the hypothesis that detritivore diversity enhances litter decomposition in streams, to establish the role of other characteristics of detritivore assemblages (abundance, biomass and body size), and to determine how patterns vary across realms, biomes and climates. We observed a positive relationship between diversity and decomposition, strongest in tropical areas, and a key role of abundance and biomass at higher latitudes. Our results suggest that litter decomposition might be altered by detritivore extinctions, particularly in tropical areas, where detritivore diversity is already relatively low and some environmental stressors particularly prevalent.

Running waters contribute substantially to global carbon fluxes through decomposition of terrestrial plant litter by aquatic microorganisms and detritivores. Diversity of this litter may influence instream decomposition globally in ways that are not yet understood. We investigated latitudinal differences in decomposition of litter mixtures of low and high functional diversity in 40 streams on 6 continents and spanning 113 degrees of latitude. Despite important variability in our dataset, we found latitudinal differences in the effect of litter functional diversity on decomposition, which we explained as evolutionary adaptations of litter-consuming detritivores to resource availability. Specifically, a balanced diet effect appears to operate at lower latitudes versus a resource concentration effect at higher latitudes. The latitudinal pattern indicates that loss of plant functional diversity will have different consequences on carbon fluxes across the globe, with greater repercussions likely at low latitudes.

Full Text, Thesis (PhD Doctorate), Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), School of Environment and Sc, Science, Environment, Engineering and Technology, Freshwater systems are dramatically transformed by human activities and are in need of effective monitoring to halt the decline of ecosystem health. Ecoacoustics presents a new cost effective way to monitor changes in ecosystems by investigating sounds and their relationships with the environment. However, while ecoacoustics has been explored as a monitoring tool in terrestrial and marine realms, it only gained traction in recent years in freshwater systems. In this thesis, I investigate ecoacoustics as a monitoring tool for freshwater systems. By investigating spatial-temporal variation in soundscapes of this realm (Chapter 2), examining the main biological drivers of these soundscapes (Chapter 3) and relating acoustic properties to environmental parameters (Chapter 4), I provide comprehensive studies on how freshwater soundscapes change and how ecoacoustics can be used as a monitoring tool. In the first study (Chapter 2), I characterize soundscapes across multiple freshwater streams, classify these streams according to their soundscape and use acoustic indices to describe spatial-temporal variation of freshwater soundscapes. The results demonstrate that soundscapes in 12 freshwater streams can be highly variable in both space and time. Even among similar streams in the same region, soundscapes differ greatly. Further all 12 streams used in this thesis have a unique soundscape with most differences between soundscapes being observed during the daytime. For the second study, I manually annotated biological sounds from the 12 freshwater streams analysed in the previous study. Results demonstrate high level of spatial and temporal variation in sound composition between streams with each stream containing a unique sound composition. The sound composition in each stream exhibits a daily cycle with site-specific sequences of sonic activity. Further, sound types are partitioned into temporal, frequency and spatial niches which aligns with the acoustic niche hypothesis. In

Full Text, Thesis (PhD Doctorate), Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), School of Environment and Sc, Conversion of forests to pasture has been extensive throughout the tropics and subtropics, and these forests continue to experience deforestation at high levels. Such clearing can alter plant-animal dynamics and thereby degrade ecosystem functioning. It is often assumed that re-establishment of vegetation will recover forest-like communities of animals such as invertebrates, together with the roles they play in important ecosystem processes. However, there has so far been little empirical evidence to support this. This thesis investigated the impact of deforestation on invertebrate-mediated ecosystem functioning, and its recovery during regeneration of rainforests on former pasture. Specifically, it focused on two key ecosystem processes which underly forest regeneration dynamics, while also comparing two different reforestation pathways. The two processes were leaf litter decomposition rates and insect seedling herbivory. For decomposition, functional associations with decomposer invertebrates as well as vegetation structure and floristics were also investigated. Both these ecosystem processes were examined across 25 sites representing different phases of rainforest deforestation and subsequent reforestation. The study area was the Numinbah Conservation Area and surrounds on the Gold Coast Hinterland, in the eastern Australian subtropics. Here the local council had begun restoration management on disused pasture approximately 10 years prior to the beginning of this thesis. Five study sites were placed in each of five vegetation types, consisting of two reference states of grazed pasture and old-growth rainforest (to represent the deforestation process and to indicate the target of restoration), together with three types of regenerating vegetation: unassisted woody regrowth aged 20-50 years on former pasture, and assisted regeneration aged 1-4 and 5-11 years after human interventions that aimed to accelerate natural regeneration within previously-unassisted regrowth

Full Text, Thesis (PhD Doctorate), Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), School of Environment and Sc, Science, Environment, Engineering and Technology, Bhutan, a small developing country, is recognised for its pro-environmental and unique development philosophy called Gross National Happiness (GNH). Over the years Bhutan has continually increased the area coverage under protected area (PA) system and probably it is the first country in the world that has achieved a 50% protection target. Going beyond the year 2020, there is a growing call to protect at the least 30% of the World’s terrestrial areas by 2030 with the ultimate goal to protect 50% by year 2050 - a goal commonly termed “Nature Needs Half’ (NNH). However, PAs globally and in Bhutan have been designated to protect terrestrial ecosystems and biodiversity. Although freshwater ecosystems and biodiversity are most threatened, there are very few freshwater specific protected areas while they are included within existing PAs by coincidence. The overall objective of this thesis is to assess the potential of existing terrestrialfocussed protected areas of Bhutan in conserving freshwater ecosystems and biodiversity within the context of nature needs half target and protected area dynamism. To achieve this, I have combined a systematic archival literature review with species distribution modelling and systematic conservation planning techniques to address four main issues: (1) the lack of a country level PA dynamism study and possible link between it and GNH, (2) lack of adequate freshwater species distribution data in Bhutan, (3) the need to assess potential of existing PA system for freshwater protection in the context of NNH, and (4) the need for systematic freshwater conservation planning in the context of NNH and PA dynamism. To address the first issue, I conducted systematic archival literature review on PA dynamism in Bhutan for almost the entire modern conservation history of Bhutan (1966- 2016). PA dynamism can be either of gain or loss events; the latter is termed protected area downgrading, downsizing and degazettement (PADDD). The conservation planning

Full Text, Thesis (PhD Doctorate), Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), School of Environment and Sc, Science, Environment, Engineering and Technology, Freshwater ecosystems represent hotspots for the world’s total diversity and human well-being. However, they are also subjected to threats across the globe as a result of localised human activities, broad scale catchment clearance, climate change and invasive species. The increased degradation of freshwater habitats and their ecological functions as a consequence of these threats, at local and global scales, has led to significant freshwater problems for human existence and the world’s biodiversity. There is growing evidence that the loss of biodiversity is one of the most complex environmental issues facing the world; however, the importance of understanding species distribution patterns and the ecological differentiation among species that are reflected as species-specific responses or tolerances to environmental drivers is less well understood. In particular, when a morphological approach is used as a taxonomic tool for investigating species diversity and species level responses to environmental drivers, the diversity of responses hidden within species complexes may not be realized, and the conclusion of generality may mask specific cryptic species responses. In South-East Queensland, Australia, European occupation since the mid 1800’s has seen large scale clearing of native vegetation along streams and rivers in nearly all catchments. As a consequence of this land-use change catchment hydrology has been substantially altered, which, combined with the presence of dams and weirs, has resulted in a decline in water quality of streams in some catchments, which is of growing concern for conservation of species biodiversity. This study aimed to explore cryptic diversity in two species complexes of freshwater aytid shrimps common in South-East Queensland and elucidate species level responses to environmental variation that could explain their spatial distribution. This broad aim was met through three specific studies. First, using regional scale data of cryptic species

The distribution and population structure of organisms is governed by a broad suite of biotic and abiotic variables, interacting across multiple scales. Recruitment is a key demographic process critical to the maintenance of successful populations. Isolating and quantifying the multiscale environmental drivers of recruitment is vital for species conservation, especially for those species with traits that increase their susceptibility to local extirpation. We developed a Bayesian hierarchical model to quantify the relationship between the rate of recruitment in a locally threatened river blackfish (Gadopsis marmoratus) and environmental predictors across two spatial scales. There was a 0.99 probability that increased broad-scale stream temperature negatively affected juvenile recruitment rate. We also found that there was a 0.97 probability that the fine-scale relationship between recruitment rate and riparian foliage cover was dependent on temperature. This suggests that broad-scale thermal conditions provide the template upon which at least one local environmental variable influences recruitment rate. Understanding drivers influencing key population processes and the spatial scales at which they operate is critical to gaining an insight into likely changes in population persistence for potentially imperilled species, along with the potential future effects of habitat degradation and climate warming on freshwater fishes in general.