Hungry 24/7? HCI design for sustainable food culture workshop

This workshop proposes to explore new approaches to cultivate and support sustainable food culture in urban environments via human computer interaction design and ubiquitous technologies. Food is a challenging issue in urban contexts: while food consumption decisions are made many times a day, most food interaction for urbanites occurs based on convenience and habitual practices. This situation is contrasting to the fact that food is at the centre of global environment, health, and social issues that are becoming increasingly immanent and imminent. As such, it is timely and crucial to ask: what are feasible, effective, and innovative ways to improve human-food-interaction through human-computer-interaction in order to contribute to environmental, health, and social sustainability in urban environments? This workshop brings together insights across disciplines to discuss this question, and plan and promote individual, local, and global change for sustainable food culture.

Host use and crop impacts of Oribius Marshall species (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) in Eastern Highlands Province, Papua New Guinea

Oribius species are small flightless weevils endemic to the island of New Guinea and far northern Cape York, Australia. The adults feed externally on leaves, developing fruit and green bark, but their impact as pests and general host use patterns are poorly known. Working in Eastern Highlands Province, Papua New Guinea, we carried out structured host use surveys, farmer surveys, shade-house growth trials, and on-farm and on-station impact trials to: (i) estimate the host range of the local Oribius species; (ii) understand adult daily activity patterns; (iii) elucidate feeding habits of the soil dwelling larvae; and (iv) quantify the impacts of adult feeding damage. Oribius inimicus and O. destructor accounted for nearly all the Oribius species encountered locally: of these two O. inimicus was the most abundant. Weevils were collected from 31 of 33 plants surveyed in the Aiyura Valley and a combination of farmer interviews and literature records provided evidence for the beetles being pestiferous on 43 crops currently or previously grown in the Highlands. Adult weevils had a distinct diurnal pattern of being in the upper plant canopy early in the morning and, to a lesser extent, again late in the afternoon. For the remainder of the day beetles resided within the canopy, or possibly off the plant. Movement of adults between plants appeared frequent. Pot trials confirmed the larvae are root feeders. Quantified impact studies showed that the weevils are damaging to a range of vegetable and orchard crops (broccoli, capsicum, celery, French bean, Irish potato, lettuce, orange and strawberry), causing average yield losses of around 30-40%, but up to 100% on citrus. Oribius weevils pose a significant and apparently growing problem for Highland’s agriculture.

Disobedient Citizens : Press Depictions of Striking School Teachers in NSW and Anti-Vietnam War Demonstrators in NSW and Victoria in 1968

Across Australia in 1968, students demonstrating against the Vietnam War engaged in confrontational behaviour. The metropolitan daily newspapers,the most important source of news for most people, enthusiastically reported the scenes. The demonstrations were exciting. Sensational headlines and photographs captured the interest of readers and influenced their opinions. But radical opposition to government policies at the time was not limited to university students opposing the Vietnam War. Teachers had become increasingly critical of conditions in schools, with Victorian secondary school teachers having stopped work on a number of occasions since 1965. In October 1968, both primary and secondary school teachers in New South Wales participated in eastern Australia’s first state-wide teachers’ strike. As Sydney’s Sun commented on 1 October 1968, “The teachers’ strike threw the ... education system into chaos ... A huge proportion of the State’s 2764 schools were silent and empty.” Similarities with the anti-war demonstrations were obvious. Although not as confrontational, the New South Wales teachers’ strike was a publicity-seeking action. This examination of the teachers’ more restrained, but more effective, approach to challenging government policies provides a new voice and vision to our understandings of the diverse nature of radicalism in Australia in the 1960s.

Phylogeography of Echinocladius martini Cranston (Diptera: Chironomidae) in closed forest streams of eastern Australia

The eastern Australian rainforests have experienced several cycles of range contraction and expansion since the late Miocene that are closely correlated with global glaciation events. Together with ongoing aridification of the continent, this has resulted in current distributions of native closed forest that are highly fragmented along the east coast. Several closed forest endemic taxa exhibit patterns of population genetic structure that are congruent with historical isolation of populations in discrete refugia and reflect evolutionary histories dramatically affected by vicariance. Currently, limited data are available regarding the impact of these past climatic fluctuations on freshwater invertebrate taxa. The non-biting midge species Echinocladius martini Cranston is distributed along the east coast and inhabits predominantly montane streams in closed forest habitat. Phylogeographic structure in E. martini was resolved here at a continental scale by incorporating data from a previous pilot study and expanding the sampling design to encompass populations in the Wet Tropics of north-eastern Queensland, south-east Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria. Patterns of phylogeographic structure revealed several deeply divergent mitochondrial lineages from central and south-eastern Australia that were previously unrecognised and were geographically endemic to closed forest refugia. Estimated divergence times were congruent with late Miocene onset of rainforest contractions across the east coast of Australia. This suggested that dispersal and gene flow among E. martini populations isolated in refugia has been highly restricted historically. Moreover, these data imply, in contrast to existing preconceptions about freshwater invertebrates, that this taxon may be acutely susceptible to habitat fragmentation.

“We eat more than kangaroo tail or dugong you know…” : recent indigenous Australian cookbooks

This paper focuses on a series of cookbooks published by Indigenous Australian groups. These cookbooks are typically produced with government funding, and are developed by nutritionists, dieticians, and health workers in consultation with local communities. They are designed to teach Indigenous Australians to cook healthy, nutritious, low-cost meals. In this paper, Fredericks and Anderson identify the value of these cookbooks as low-cost, public health interventions. However, they note that their value as health interventions has not been tested. Fredericks and Anderson question the value of these cookbooks within the broader context of the health disadvantage faced by Indigenous Australians. They argue that the cookbooks are developed from a Western perspective of health and nutrition that fails to recognise the value of traditional Indigenous foodways. They suggest that incorporating more Indigenous food knowledge and food-related traditions into cookbooks may be one way of improving health among Indigenous peoples and revitalising Indigenous knowledge.

‘We’ve always cooked kangaroo. We still cook kangaroo. Although sometimes we use cookbooks now’ : Aboriginal Australians and cookbooks

Aboriginal Australians have a long history of eating native animals and plants. Food preparation techniques were handed down through the generations, without any need for cookbooks. But colonisation changed the diets of Aboriginal Australians, introducing us to a processed diet high in salt, sugar and fat, and causing a wide range of diet-related health problems. Over the years, many Aboriginal Australians lost their connections to traditional food preparation practices. In this paper, the authors provide a brief overview of Aboriginal food history and describe a newly-emerging focus on reintroducing native foods. They describe the work of an Aboriginal chef, Dale Chapman, who is actively promoting native foods and creating a native-Western food fusion. Chapman has developed native food recipes and a cookbook, in an effort to make native foods accessible to all Australians. She promotes a future when native foods are part of the identity of all Australians – both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal.

Taxonomy and redescription of the Yellow-footed Antechinus, Antechinus flavipes (Waterhouse) (Marsupialia: Dasyuridae)

We provide a taxonomic redescription of the ubiquitous and variable dasyurid marsupial Yellow-footed Antechinus, Antechinus flavipes (Waterhouse), which comprises three currently recognized subspecies whose combined geographic distribution spans almost the length and breadth of Australia. A. flavipes leucogaster Gray is confined to south-west Western Australia; A. flavipes flavipes is distributed in south-eastern Australia across four states—South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland; A. flavipes rubeculus Van Dyck is confined to the wet tropics of Queensland. A. flavipes is readily distinguished from all extant congeners based on external morphology by the following combination of features: a grey head; orange-yellow toned flanks/rump, feet and tail base; pale eye-rings and a darkened tail tip. A. flavipes skulls are stout, being broad at the level of the rear upper molars, have small palatal vacuities and small entoconid cusps on the lower molars. However, notable differences among subspecies of A. flavipesprevent any obvious collection of skull characters being diagnostic for species-level discrimination among congeners. A. flavipes rubeculus is the largest of the three subspecies of Yellow-footed Antechinus and most similar in skull morphology to A. leo, A. bellus and A. godmani—all four species are geographically limited to tropical Australia. A. f. rubeculus is notably larger in many characters than its conspecifics: A. f. flavipes, the next largest, and A. f. leucogaster, the smallest of the group. A. f. flavipes and A. f. leucogaster diverge significantly at only a few skull characters, and both subspecies have cranial morphological affinities with the recently discovered A. mysticus, most notably A. f. leucogaster. Phylogenies generated from mt- and nDNA data strongly support Antechinus flavipes as monophyletic with respect to other members of the genus; within A. flavipes, each of the three recognized subspecies form distinctive monophyletic clades.

Survey of Fusarium species associated with crown rot of wheat and barley in eastern Australia

Fusarium species associated with crown rot were isolated and identified from 409 wheat, barley or durum wheat crops from the eastern Australian grain belt between 1996 and 1999. Fusarium pseudograminearum was almost the only species isolated from crops in Queensland and New South Wales. F. pseudograminearum was also the most common species in Victoria and South Australia, but F. culmorum was frequently isolated in these states. F. culmorum accounted for more than 70% of isolates from the Victorian high-rainfall (> 500 mm) region and the South-East region of South Australia. F. culmorum comprised 18% of isolates from the Victorian medium-rainfall (350-500 mm) region, and 7% of isolates from each of the Victorian low-rainfall region and the Mid-North region of South Australia. F. avenaceum, F. crookwellense and F. graminearum were isolated very infrequently. The proportion of F. culmorum among isolates of Fusarium from districts in Victoria and South Australia was strongly correlated with climatic conditions around the end of the growing season, especially with rainfall in November.

The limit to wheat water-use efficiency in eastern Australia. I. Gradients in the radiation environment and atmospheric demand

In the wheatbelt of eastern Australia, rainfall shifts from winter dominated in the south (South Australia, Victoria) to summer dominated in the north (northern New South Wales, southern Queensland). The seasonality of rainfall, together with frost risk, drives the choice of cultivar and sowing date, resulting in a flowering time between October in the south and August in the north. In eastern Australia, crops are therefore exposed to contrasting climatic conditions during the critical period around flowering, which may affect yield potential, and the efficiency in the use of water (WUE) and radiation (RUE). In this work we analysed empirical and simulated data, to identify key climatic drivers of potential water- and radiation-use efficiency, derive a simple climatic index of environmental potentiality, and provide an example of how a simple climatic index could be used to quantify the spatial and temporal variability in resource-use efficiency and potential yield in eastern Australia. Around anthesis, from Horsham to Emerald, median vapour pressure deficit (VPD) increased from 0.92 to 1.28 kPa, average temperature increased from 12.9 to 15.2°C, and the fraction of diffuse radiation (FDR) decreased from 0.61 to 0.41. These spatial gradients in climatic drivers accounted for significant gradients in modelled efficiencies: median transpiration WUE (WUEB/T) increased southwards at a rate of 2.6% per degree latitude and median RUE increased southwards at a rate of 1.1% per degree latitude. Modelled and empirical data confirmed previously established relationships between WUEB/T and VPD, and between RUE and photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) and FDR. Our analysis also revealed a non-causal inverse relationship between VPD and radiation-use efficiency, and a previously unnoticed causal positive relationship between FDR and water-use efficiency. Grain yield (range 1-7 t/ha) measured in field experiments across South Australia, New South Wales, and Queensland (n = 55) was unrelated to the photothermal quotient (Pq = PAR/T) around anthesis, but was significantly associated (r2 = 0.41, P < 0.0001) with newly developed climatic index: a normalised photothermal quotient (NPq = Pq . FDR/VPD). This highlights the importance of diffuse radiation and vapour pressure deficit as sources of variation in yield in eastern Australia. Specific experiments designed to uncouple VPD and FDR and more mechanistic crop models might be required to further disentangle the relationships between efficiencies and climate drivers.

Foods of pigeons and doves in fragmented landscapes of subtropical eastern Australia

We report dietary items of pigeons and doves from northern New South Wales and southern Queensland, obtained from opportunistic sampling of the gut contents of dead birds and observing foraging birds. Most records were from fragmented rainforest habitats, which now support abundant invasive fleshy-fruited plants. The fruits and seeds of invasive plants, particularly Camphor Laurel Cinnamomum camphora, formed the dominant food of several of the species sampled, although in some cases these birds appear to destroy most of the ingested seeds in the gizzard, thereby not contributing to weed dispersal. We also describe the first records of White-headed Pigeons Columba leucomela eating flowers and Brown Cuckoo-Doves Macropygia amboinensis eating flower buds. Camphor Laurel, via flowers, green and ripe fruits, and seeds, provided food for White-headed Pigeons in the Goolmangar district of New South Wales throughout the entire year. Seventy percent of the plant species whose fruits and seeds were recovered from the gut had not previously been recorded as food items for those bird species, illustrating how little is known about the diets of pigeons and doves in fragmented Australian landscapes.

Scat contents of the spotted-tailed quoll Dasyurus maculatus in the New England gorges, north-eastern New South Wales

In 1313 scats of the spotted-tailed quoll Dasyurus maculatus, collected over 5 years from the gorge country of north-eastern New South Wales, the most frequent and abundant items were derived from mammals and a restricted set of insect orders. These quolls also ate river-associated items: waterbirds, eels, crayfish, aquatic molluscs and even frogs. Macropods contributed most of the mammal items, with possums, gliders and rodents also being common. Some food, particularly from macropods and lagomorphs, had been scavenged (as shown by fly larvae). The most frequent invertebrates were three orders of generally large insects Coleoptera, Hemiptera and Orthoptera, which were most frequent in summer and almost absent in winter scats. Monthly mean numbers of rodent and small dasyurid items per scat were inversely related to these large insects in scats. The numbers of reptile items were inversely related to the numbers of mammal (especially arboreal and small terrestrial mammal) items per scat, thus types of items interacted in their occurrences in monthly scat samples. Frequencies of most vertebrate items showed no seasonal, but much year-to-year, variation. This quoll population ate four main types of items, each requiring different skills to obtain: they hunted arboreal marsupials (possibly up trees), terrestrial small mammals and reptiles (on the ground), and seasonally available large insects (on trees or the ground), and scavenged carcases, mostly of large mammals but also birds and fishes (wherever they could find them).

Climate change effects on pasture systems in south-eastern Australia.

Climate change projections for Australia predict increasing temperatures, changes to rainfall patterns, and elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations. The aims of this study were to predict plant production responses to elevated CO2 concentrations using the SGS Pasture Model and DairyMod, and then to quantify the effects of climate change scenarios for 2030 and 2070 on predicted pasture growth, species composition, and soil moisture conditions of 5 existing pasture systems in climates ranging from cool temperate to subtropical, relative to a historical baseline. Three future climate scenarios were created for each site by adjusting historical climate data according to temperature and rainfall change projections for 2030, 2070 mid-and 2070 high-emission scenarios, using output from the CSIRO Mark 3 global climate model. In the absence of other climate changes, mean annual pasture production at an elevated CO2 concentration of 550 ppm was predicted to be 24-29% higher than at 380 ppm CO2 in temperate (C-3) species-dominant pastures in southern Australia, with lower mean responses in a mixed C-3/C-4 pasture at Barraba in northern New South Wales (17%) and in a C-4 pasture at Mutdapilly in south-eastern Queensland (9%). In the future climate scenarios at the Barraba and Mutdapilly sites in subtropical and subhumid climates, respectively, where climate projections indicated warming of up to 4.4 degrees C, with little change in annual rainfall, modelling predicted increased pasture production and a shift towards C-4 species dominance. In Mediterranean, temperate, and cool temperate climates, climate change projections indicated warming of up to 3.3 degrees C, with annual rainfall reduced by up to 28%. Under future climate scenarios at Wagga Wagga, NSW, and Ellinbank, Victoria, our study predicted increased winter and early spring pasture growth rates, but this was counteracted by a predicted shorter spring growing season, with annual pasture production higher than the baseline under the 2030 climate scenario, but reduced by up to 19% under the 2070 high scenario. In a cool temperate environment at Elliott, Tasmania, annual production was higher than the baseline in all 3 future climate scenarios, but highest in the 2070 mid scenario. At the Wagga Wagga, Ellinbank, and Elliott sites the effect of rainfall declines on pasture production was moderated by a predicted reduction in drainage below the root zone and, at Ellinbank, the use of deeper rooted plant systems was shown to be an effective adaptation to mitigate some of the effect of lower rainfall.

The stock structure of grey mackerel Scomberomorus semifasciatus in Australia as inferred from its parasite fauna

The scombrid Scomberomorus semifasciatus is an important component of inshore fisheries in tropical Australia. Data on the parasite fauna of 593 fish from areas off northern and eastern Australia were examined for evidence of discrete fish populations. The parasites used were juveniles of Pterobothrium pearsoni, Callitetrarhynchus gracilis, Anisakis simplex (sensu latu) and Terranova sp. Tukey Kramer pairwise comparisons gave significant differences in the abundances of two or more parasites between fish from the east coast, the eastern Gulf of Carpentaria and the remainder of northern Australia. Multivariate analysis gave further evidence of differences and the results suggest that at least 4 populations or stocks of grey mackerel occur along the northern and eastern coastline of Australia.

Reassessing spatial and temporal dynamics of kangaroo populations

Long-running datasets from aerial surveys of kangaroos (Macropus giganteus, Macropus [uliginosus, Macropus robustus and Macropus rufus) across Queensland, New South Wales and South Australia have been analysed, seeking better predictors of rates of increase which would allow aerial surveys to be undertaken less frequently than annually. Early models of changes in kangaroo numbers in response to rainfall had shown great promise, but much variability. We used normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI) instead, reasoning that changes in pasture condition would provide a better predictor than rainfall. However, except at a fine scale, NDVI proved no better; although two linked periods of rainfall proved useful predictors of rates of increase, this was only in some areas for some species. The good correlations reported in earlier studies were a consequence of data dominated by large droughtinduced adult mortality, whereas over a longer time frame and where changes between years are less dramatic, juvenile survival has the strongest influence on dynamics. Further, harvesting, density dependence and competition with domestic stock are additional and important influences and it is now clear that kangaroo movement has a greater influence on population dynamics than had been assumed. Accordingly, previous conclusions about kangaroo populations as simple systems driven by rainfall need to be reassessed. Examination of this large dataset has permitted descriptions of shifts in distribution of three species across eastern Australia, changes in dispersion in response to rainfall, and an evaluation of using harvest statistics as an index of density and harvest rate. These results have been combined into a risk assessment and decision theory framework to identify optimal monitoring strategies.

Presence and incidence of food-borne pathogens in Australian chicken litter.

1. Litter samples were collected at the end of the production cycle from spread litter in a single shed from each of 28 farms distributed across the three Eastern seaboard States of Australia. 2. The geometric mean for Salmonella was 44 Most Probable Number (MPN)/g for the 20 positive samples. Five samples were between 100 and 1000 MPN/g and one at 105 MPN/g, indicating a range of factors are contributing to these varying loads of this organism in litter. 3. The geometric mean for Campylobacter was 30 MPN/g for the 10 positive samples, with 7 of these samples being 100 MPN/g. The low prevalence and incidence of Campylobacter were possibly due to the rapid die-off of this organism. 4. E. coli values were markedly higher than the two key pathogens (geometric mean 20 x 105 colony forming units (cfu)/g) with overall values being more or less within the same range across all samples in the trial, suggesting a uniform contribution pattern of these organisms in litter. 5. Listeria monocytogenes was absent in all samples and this organism appears not to be an issue in litter. 6. The dominant (70% of the isolates) Salmonella serovar was S. Sofia (a common serovar isolated from chickens in Australia) and was isolated across all regions. Other major serovars were S. Virchow and S. Chester (at 10%) and S. Bovismorbificans and S. Infantis (at 8%) with these serovars demonstrating a spatial distribution across the major regions tested. 7. There is potential to re-use litter in the environment depending on end use and the support of relevant application practices and guidelines.