Data management strategy Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder’s Science Program (Flow Monitoring, Evaluation and Research)

Flow-MER is the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder’s (CEWH) Monitoring, Evaluation and Research program. Its objective is to monitor and evaluate the ecological responses to the delivery of Commonwealth environmental water in the Murray–Darling Basin (the Basin). It provides the CEWH with evidence to inform our understanding of how water for the environment is helping maintain, protect and restore the ecosystems and native species across the Basin.

This Flow-MER data management strategy is one of 5 strategies that will guide the delivery of the Flow-MER program. The data management strategy outlines how the Flow-MER program will provide high-quality data and information to support effective and efficient delivery of evaluation and research by a wide variety of policymakers, managers, scientists and industry partners. Flow-MER will publish open data, free of usage constraints wherever possible, but will protect sensitive information and intellectual property, including First Nations’ Indigenous and cultural intellectual property. The strategy recognises Indigenous data sovereignty and will support First Nations people to have ownership and autonomy over their data.

The data management strategy outlines roles and responsibilities for robust governance, with codevelopment of data standards and delivery models to ensure a cohesive vision and consistent approach to information management. The strategy will guide data management to support aggregation of high-quality long-term data from multiple contributing project sites in the Basin operating over multiple years, with the program now entering its second decade of operation. The data management strategy is designed to secure Flow-MER data for the long term, providing a legacy of accessible published data beyond the duration of individual projects. These data will provide a valuable public asset that can support management, evaluation, research, knowledge exchange and community engagement into the future.