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China has implemented a series of water-saving policies in response to the growing threat of water shortages. However, it remains unclear whether these water-saving policies, which aim to reduce water-use intensity, will actually improve water-use technical efficiency. This study scrutinizes water-use technical efficiency within an extended human-environment framework by using the case of China's South–North Water Transfer Project (SNWTP). An improved estimation method for water-use technical efficiency based on stochastic frontier analysis is adopted to empirically investigate the variations in water-use intensity and technical efficiency in the SNWTP's water-receiving cities. This study argues that there is no definitive link between improvements in water-use technical efficiency and decreases in water-use intensity, and thus water-saving policies oriented toward reducing water-use intensity do not necessarily increase water-use technical efficiency. In addition, achieving the goals of water-saving policies by reducing water use intensity alone remains challenging and requires improving the water-use technical efficiency caused by endogenous technological progress. Finally, setting a unified target to reduce water-use intensity leads to inequitable sharing of water-saving tasks between regions, resulting in conflicts of interest among government bureaucracies.

Diverse and inclusive marine research is paramount to addressing ocean sustainability challenges in the 21st century, as envisioned by the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development. Despite increasing efforts to diversify ocean science, women continue to face barriers at various stages of their career, which inhibits their progression to leadership within academic institutions. In this perspective, we draw on the collective experiences of thirty-four global women leaders, bolstered by a narrative review, to identify practical strategies and actions that will help empower early career women researchers to become the leaders of tomorrow. We propose five strategies: (i) create a more inclusive culture, (ii) ensure early and equitable career development opportunities for women ECRs, (iii) ensure equitable access to funding for women ECRs, (iv) offer mentoring opportunities and, (v) create flexible, family-friendly environments. Transformational, meaningful, and lasting change will only be achieved through commitment and collaborative action across various scales and by multiple stakeholders.

Water set aside for environmental purposes is now the fastest-growing category of water use in China. Since 2000 this 'ecological water' (EcoW) has grown to make up 5 % of the total water allocation (around 30 billion m3 of water). This paper provides the first substantial review of the history, definition, and policy rationale for EcoW in China, and allows us to compare the Chinese program with elsewhere. As in most countries, the growth in EcoW is a response to the over-allocation of water, and a recognition of the broader values of aquatic systems. In contrast to other countries, most EcoW is still allocated to support human values more than natural values. The earliest, and most celebrated EcoW projects, were directed at reducing dust pollution from arid zone rivers affecting northern China. In other countries, most environmental water is clawed back from other users in a catchment (usually irrigators) and is then delivered as a quasi-natural flow regime from a dam. These sorts of environmental flows from dams do occur in China, represented by the EcoW diversion in the Heihe River Basin and the Yellow River Basin. By contrast, the largest EcoW programs do not replace existing uses. Instead, they augment flows through large interbasin transfers. The largest and fastest-growing EcoW program in China is on the North China Plain (NCP) based on excess water available from the South-North Water Transfer project. To illustrate the complexity of EcoW projects in China, we describe in more detail two case studies, the well-established arid-zone Heihe EcoW program and the newer Jin-Jin-Ji EcoW program on the NCP. Overall, ecological water allocation in China reflects a major development in water management in that country and a growing shift toward more holistic water management.

Diverse and inclusive marine research is paramount to addressing ocean sustainability challenges in the 21st century, as envisioned by the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development. Despite increasing efforts to diversify ocean science, women continue to face barriers at various stages of their career, which inhibits their progression to leadership within academic institutions. In this perspective, we draw on the collective experiences of thirty-four global women leaders, bolstered by a narrative review, to identify practical strategies and actions that will help empower early career women researchers to become the leaders of tomorrow. We propose five strategies: (i) create a more inclusive culture, (ii) ensure early and equitable career development opportunities for women ECRs, (iii) ensure equitable access to funding for women ECRs, (iv) offer mentoring opportunities and, (v) create flexible, family-friendly environments. Transformational, meaningful, and lasting change will only be achieved through commitment and collaborative action across various scales and by multiple stakeholders.

Rome’s Horrea Piperataria – or ‘Pepper Warehouse’ – receives little more than a passing mention in our discussions of the Imperial Forum. Given the minimal archaeological and textual record, this is not surprising. Within a century of its Domitianic construction, the horrea had all but burned to the ground. When the Basilica of Maxentius was constructed in the early fourth century, the horrea disappeared from view entirely. It would seem that Rome’s emporium of herbs and spices from across the Empire has little to tell us. But is that the whole story? Recent excavations beneath the Basilica have uncovered new details about the warehouse’s internal space. If we consider the visual literacy of Rome’s population, we can situate the horrea within an architectural typology and begin to uncover its presence within the city. And adopting a post-colonial lens both reconstructs the social experience of this site and interrogates its post-classical scholarly reception. Many locations across the Roman world possess an equally fragmentary record. Yet many also enjoy considerably more attention in the literature than the Horrea Piperataria. This paper will reveal the horrea as a site of multicultural exchange and social identity in a diverse ancient city. In this process, it will also question whether eurocentrism incorrectly shaped – or rather diminished – our view of the Horrea Piperataria as being of minimal importance in the imperial power landscape.

Mediterranean Archaeology Australian Research Committee Conference 2022

Invited panel presentation for the public program of the ‘Open Horizons: Ancient Greek Journeys and Connections’ Exhibition at Melbourne Museum

Living Digital heritage Conference

The location of significant public facilities in Melbourne's 'Hoddle Grid' deliberately imposes representations of colonial power from the Ancient Roman empire onto the lands of the Kulin Nations.

Researcher Connect Tech-Travaganza

Transformative Learning Summit

Ancient World Seminar Series: The Horrea Piperataria – or ‘Pepper Warehouse’ – is a shadowy presence in our understanding of Rome’s imperial forum. Built by Domitian in the late first century CE, it had been reduced to ashes by the end of the second century. In the early fourth century, what little remained of the horrea vanished as the Basilica of Maxentius occupied its site. Rome’s emporium of herbs and spices from across the Empire has, perhaps unsurprisingly, received little attention in scholarship. However, this presentation will demonstrate that interrogating what little we do know about the Horrea Piperataria reveals not only the nature of this site but also its role in shaping social identity. Adopting a post-colonial lens, ‘An Exploration of Rome's Horrea Piperataria’ reconstructs the socio-cultural encounters of this site and how these shaped external experiences of the city’s imperial power landscape.

Classical Association of Victoria Teachers’ Wing Conference

History Teachers’ Association of Victoria VCE History Conference

Little is known in the international academic community about Chinese‐language research on water management. To remedy this deficit, this paper reviews current mainland Chinese understandings of the role of large‐scale water infrastructures as tools of water resources management. We reviewed 461 papers published in mainland Chinese journals by Chinese scholars. This review suggests that the dominant approach to water management reflects the confines of government priorities—large‐scale, concrete‐heavy, infrastructure‐based means of moving water around the country so as to meet demands and stimulate economic growth. Suppression of critical voices means that infrastructure is generally rendered apolitical: the critiques are about practical issues, such as technological, managerial, or administrative problems. There are exceptions to this characterization that adopt more critical frames; however, they reflect on water management elsewhere or in the past rather than on contemporary China. While these more critical papers are interesting and important contributions to our understanding of the politics of hydraulic infrastructures, the literature as a whole says little about the politics of infrastructure in China now. In effect, much of the literature in Chinese on water management in China simply acts as an arm of a machine—a network of corporations, universities, international institutions, and arms of the government, together tasked with identifying and framing what are water management issues, formulating standardized procedures for tackling those issues, and then constructing solutions to them. This article is categorized under: Engineering Water > Planning Water Human Water > Water Governance