Kia ora koutou,
Welcome to the Maritime Topic Hub. The Maritime environment contains a wide range of actors and perspectives, including everything from harm prevention in areas such as ports, the safety of recreational craft, impact on the marine environment from emissions, analysis of NZ’s international supply chain and rescue co-ordination and incident response. The topic hubs seeks to support the widespread maritime whānau by promoting evidence, enabling connections across a dynamic and complex setting. We encourage anyone with an interest to come along and contribute.
Upcoming events:
Ocean Flyer: bringing seagliders to our shores - 17 August 2022 2:00pm-3:00pm
We have planes, we have ferries, and now Ocean Flyer presents seagliders. Join this Technology and Innovation / Maritime hub joint session to hear about an exciting new zero-emission approach to travel in Aotearoa.
Speakers: Shah Aslam, CEO – Ocean Flyer and John Hamilton, Director, Operations – Ocean Flyer
Register for the event here(external link)
Psychology and Safety - a tale of two studies - 24 August 2022
Join us for a discussion on psychology and safety featuring academics, practitioners and government bodies. In this session Maria Carrera Arce of the World Maritime University will provide a summary of a recently published paper(external link) on SAFEMODE, an EU project looking at how to build a safety learning culture.
Register for the event here(external link)
Objectives:
The hub exists to:
- Build connections between maritime researchers, analysts and data practitioners working in the maritime domain
- Support the application of research and analysis to policy & practice
- Develop future research opportunities through making data available for analysis and other forms of collaboration
Common themes
From the cast-off meeting for the Maritime Hub, some common themes emerged to inform the Hub’s direction. These are described below and will act as priorities to define what new research and analysis is relevant for presentation and discussion through the hub.
These are grouped in following aspects of change:
- Systems – where are the vulnerabilities within the maritime system, and what are the dependencies? In New Zealand, this includes ensuring Te Tiriti o Waitangi is at the centre of decision-making and that is reflected in system evolution. Wider examples include the pandemic recovery, shifts in supply chains that include implications for inventory storage, connection timings and building capability to support system resilience.
- Boat design – new craft are emerging such as seagliders, and some new features are becoming more widespread, such as foils. What are the related changes behaviours and new risks associated with safety of humans and marine species?
- Environmental sustainability – policy levers are shifting so that choices that are environmentally sustainable are seen as more attractive. Ships are being built with new and diverse propulsion mechanisms that use alternative fuels to bunkers. What are the new risks related to safety, security and environmental protection? What developments are also underway in risk identification and mitigation?
- Data collection – technology has enhanced information collection and distribution options, including aspects such as autonomous vessels, new navigations systems, tracking and geo-fencing. What are the issues associated with this Increasing complexity, and are there implications on cognitive load with more data and information being available – what does this suggest for system capacity, training, the effect on decision making in dynamic situations?
- Climate change and extreme weather – How do changes made to models for forecasting and communicating changes indicate effects on infrastructure and safety? What are the impacts on marine ecosystems as a consequence of environmental change, including warming and rising waters, increased turbulence and invasive species risk through biofouling and ballast water? What impacts can we expect on behaviour related to kaimoana, commercial and recreational.
This will be iterative and developed over time, the hub is a space for new ideas so if you think we’ve missed something do get in touch.
Topic hub activities
All are welcome to join. The topic hub activities will be tagged to make related documents easy to find. As bodies of water touch of all of us in some way, so too will the subjects covered. The domain is relevant to all the Ministry of Transport Outcomes Framework elements which will be one set of tags:
- Inclusive access
- Healthy and safe people
- Economic prosperity
- Environmental sustainability
- Resilience and security
We will also tag material related to Maritime New Zealand’s System Outcomes:
- Safe People & Operations: Supporting physical, social & economic wellbeing through safe maritime operations
- Secure Ports & Ships: Protecting people, goods and NZ’s social & economic interests
- Clean Seas & Waterways: Playing our part in protecting and preserving the marine environment by minimising harmful emissions and discharges from ships
Finally, we’ll also tag with three related areas of interest that apply widely, but particularly in governance:
- Industry & personal perspectives,
- Future influences, and
- Regulatory Practice
Three main types of activity will take place:
- Communication within the group about new research, data and analysis priorities and projects
- Regular meetings of a working group every quarter to update research and analysis pipelines and support ongoing projects
- Events to discuss specific research, data or analytical outputs, usually through a presentation or seminar
Hub leads and membership
The hub lead is Tom Eats (MNZ) Tom.Eats@maritimenz.govt.nz.
The hub is open to anyone interested in sharing or discussing urban transport related experience, data, information and research. Email knowledgehub@transport.govt.nz to join.