In 2025, the TERN Research Directions Survey 2025–2035 gathered over 180 responses from researchers, data users, and stakeholders across Australia. Today, we are releasing an Exposure Draft of the findings and inviting the community to help shape how these insights feed into TERN’s future planning.
We recently conducted the TERN Research Directions 2025–2035 Survey to better understand Australia’s environmental research community and identify their emerging priorities in ecosystem science and the data and analytical capabilities required to support them. The survey was led by TERN’s Strategic Engagement and Futures team and took place in September–October 2025. Findings from this survey will guide the development of the TERN Strategic Plan 2026–2031.
In December 2025, we published ‘A First Glimpse into the Next Decade’ which revealed the 300+ research questions that reveal how Australia’s terrestrial ecosystem research community sees its field evolving — what questions are rising in importance, how observation and analysis practices are changing and where researchers see gaps or emerging needs.
Now, we are pleased to release the Exposure Draft, which presents TERN’s interpretation of findings from the survey and is intended to support discussion and further engagement.
What you told us
The top 6 insights shaping the next ecosystem observatory strategic plan
1. Stewardship matters
shifting from understanding to protecting and restoring
2. Biodiversity and climate are drivers
interconnected ecosystems are the focus
3. Integration > instruments
the next leap is smarter linking, not more data
4. Strategic model coupling
integrating models drives actionable insights
5. Shared theory of change
pathways from data to action are essential
6. Vision for 2035
seamless flows, real-time insights, citizen stewardship
Word cloud based on the most frequent keywords in the responses to question 1 of the survey:
‘What are the most pressing research questions you hope to answer over the next 5–10 years?’
Give us feedback
As we prepare to incorporate the survey findings into the TERN Strategic Plan 2026-2031, we would love to keep you and the community engaged. Indeed, this Exposure Draft is an opportunity to check our interpretation of the survey responses and an invitation for further feedback from the research community. Do the priorities identified in the Exposure Draft reflect what you are seeing across terrestrial ecosystem science in Australia? Where would coordinated investment deliver the
greatest impact across the community? To provide feedback to these questions and more, follow the links below. We’d love to hear from you!
Submit a written response
Join a roundtable
Email your feedback on the consultation questions in the Exposure Draft to tern@uq.edu.au by COB Monday, 2 March 2026 (AEST)
Register here to participate in February 2026 online discussions on the future of Australia’s terrestrial ecosystem research infrastructure.
‘The exciting science we hear about in 30 years will be the product of the research infrastructures we construct today’
~ International Conference on Research Infrastructures, Vienna, 14 Sept 2017