Status: Completed
Start date: 1 July 2017
Completion date: 30 June 2022
Project code: P01-E-008
Species/Threats: Multiple
Download project report (PDF, 4.57 MB)
This project upgraded the Centre’s PestSmart and Weeds Australia best practice management information websites. The move was part of the Centre’s digital strategy (2015 update) to better use technology to meet the needs of its audiences and organisations.
This project sought to ensure that invasive species best practice information is easily and readily available to our end-users and can be shared through our partner and member organisations, so they can be confident they are sharing information which is factual, correct and relevant to their stakeholders.
Technical challenges arose when the Centre attempted to combine the FeralScan and PestSmart websites, so the project team revised its strategy in a way that brought together knowledge and resources that better suited an environment of increased citizen science data. This resulted in a consultant developing a long-term digital asset plan.
The objectives of this project were:
Weeds Australia launched 13th April 2020 and has had 289, 376 page views via 75,090 users. The site is still a beta version while all 398 weeds profiles are undergoing a technical review with approximately 50% now completed.
The PestSmart upgrade was launched 24th August 2020 and has had 141,922 page views from 73,101 users. The site has also had 9 orders of glovebox guides resulting in 7000 printed guides going out across Australia between September and December 2020. A new feral cat management glovebox guide has been developed and is now available to download/print.
All websites are live and performing well the next stage is to develop a long-term adoption plan and provide some final modifications to the sites.
After two years of stakeholder engagement and a co-design website planning and development process involving consultation with more than 500 stakeholders across the pest animal and weeds community, this project has successfully delivered the following national digital invasive species extension platforms:
A brand-new national weeds website – Weeds Australia (released as beta version in April) –www.weeds.org.au
An upgraded and new look national pest animals website -PestSmart (released in August) –www.pestsmart.org.au
A new community engagement information portal -Community Invasives Action (released in July) –www.community.invasives.com.au
An official partnership was formed with the Atlas of Living Australia to house the Centre’s 398 Weeds Australia profiles through their profiles tool. This will ensure the weed profiles are maintained through a long-term national database. The profiles will be linked seamlessly into a new Weeds Australia website, ensuring no user confusion between the sites. The project is on track to deliver a dynamic and engaging new national weeds website which will be up and running in its first stage format in 2020.
Landholders, researchers, policy analysts and extension officers (private and public) participated in a workshop focused on developing the new PestSmart website architecture in October 2019. The upgraded website is now currently in development and on track to be delivered by May 2020. In addition, the project is delivering a microsite dedicated to all CISS community engagement and behavior change resources, along with a prominent landing page to bring all the resources together – these are in progress and should be complete by August 2020.
Over 600 key users and stakeholder groups have been engaged over the past 24 months, to develop the pest animal and weed best practice management digital extension resources.
In partnership with Atlas of Living Australia, the weeds website strategy has been completed. A national website will be delivered by January 2020. An upgrade of the PestSmart website is progressing through user surveys. Further understanding of user experience will ensure development of a wireframe with clear information processes, planned to launch by May 2020.
Both websites will form Australia’s first Invasives Portal, a digital system dedicated to promoting best practice management of invasives in Australia.
Once up and running, the weeds website content updates will be managed by a contractor. User experience workshops for PestSmart, and the development of a website tender to start the website build will also be contracted.
Over the past 12 months, the CISS digital communications delivery team has focused on engagement with users of weeds information to ensure that the creation of a new national weeds information website meets their needs.
To this end, the team has attended key stakeholder meetings, run an online survey and undertaken a workshop which has resulted in developing a preliminary website framework which will be road tested over the coming months.
McDonald I and McKinnon M (2019) Communicating biosecurity information to Australian-registered veterinarians Australian Veterinary Journal. https://doi.org/10.1111/avj.12843.
