Course Title: Aquatic Resources Management

Part A: Course Overview

Course Title: Aquatic Resources Management

Credit Points: 12.00


Course Coordinator: Prof. Dayanthi Nugegoda

Course Coordinator Phone: +61 3 9925 7150

Course Coordinator Email: dayanthi.nugegoda@rmit.edu.au

Course Coordinator Location: Bundoora 223.1.44

Course Coordinator Availability: by appointment


Pre-requisite Courses and Assumed Knowledge and Capabilities

Basic Ecology or equivalent


Course Description

This course introduces the concept of managing aquatic resources for maximum sustainable use.  it is a practical focus which will teach you skills in the identification and evaluation of marine and freshwater resources and current strategies in resorces management.

It will prepare you to utilise the concepts of integrated catchment management and cosal resource management in the field.  It will also train you in the pre and post development enviornmental impact assessment of aquatic habitats.


Objectives/Learning Outcomes/Capability Development

At the end of the course, you are expected to be able to:

  • describe and evluate the productivity of aquatic ecosystems and the condition and type of aquatic resources in a given freshwater or marine habitat.
  • understand and apply the prinicples of integrated catchment management in planning the utilisation of given aquatic resources
  • evaluate the environmental impacts of different methods of fishing
  • evaluate fishery resorces and calculate maximum sustainable catch in fisheries: model and discuss the impact of the overfishing on fish stocks
  • describe and apply methods of culturing both tropical and temperate finfish, molluscs, crustacceans, microscopic and macroscopic plants and zooplankton
  • understand and apply nutrition management in aquaculture with special emphasis on minimising environmental pollution from nutrient release


This course contributes to the following Program Learning Outcomes at AQF level 9

  • PLO 1.1 a body knowledge that includes the understanding of recent developments in both the understanding of environmental processes and the technological advances in measurement techniques. remediation processes and pollution control
  • PLO 2.2 cognitive, technical and creatuve skills enabling you to investigate analyse and synthesis complex information, problems, concepts and theories about the environment, and to apply established theories to different areas of knowledge or practice concerning the environment
  • PLO 2.4 communication and technical research skills to enable you to justify and interpret theoretical propositions, methodologies, conlusions and professional decisions to specialist and non specilalist audiences


Overview of Learning Activities

The learning activites required for this course are:

  • Lectures on campus and/or online via MyRMIT blackboard
  • Laboratory experiments - a series of designed laboratory exercises with be conducted
  • Flied trip/s will be organised to a local freshwater or marine site of interest or an aquaculture farm and you will be guided through an assessment of the resources and the management plan for the site
  • Desk top case study - data from a study in fisheries, aquaculture or a degraded aquatic habitat will be provided to you.  You will undertake a desktop case study on the selected resource, discuss the methods used and prose an appropriate management strategy for resource.
  • Literature review and seminar - this practical work involves mainly the use of library facilities for searching the scientific literature, writing critical reviews of the research topic and communicating an overview of the material literature verbally


Overview of Learning Resources

  • Lecture notes and review papers on MyRMIT blackboard
  • Desk top simulation of management of an aquatic resources
  • Recommended textbooks and journal articles
  • RMIT Library resources online and onsite


Overview of Assessment

  • Final examination
  • Field trip reports and lab reports
  • Desktop case study
  • Literature review and seminar