The Migration of Horticultural Knowledge: Pacific Island seasonal workers in rural Australia-a missed opportunity?

In 2012, Graeme Hugo wrote the article \u27Migration and Development in Low-income Countries: A Role for Destination Country Policy?\u27 for the inaugural issue of the journal Migration and Development. That article, which continues to be the journal\u27s most viewed work,1 used the case of Asian and Pacific migration to Australia to question \u27whether policies and practices by destination governments relating to international migration and settlement can play a role in facilitating positive developmental impacts in origin communities\u27 (Hugo 2012, 25). The importance of such structural support for development has been underscored, in relation to seasonal worker programs, by growing evidence that their broader development benefits-beyond the household or family unit-cannot be taken for granted (Basok 2000; Craven 2015; Joint Standing Committee on Migration (JSCM) 2016). In this essay we take inspiration from the above-mentioned paper (Hugo 2012), as well as an earlier discussion of \u27best practice\u27 temporary labour migration for development (Hugo 2009). Reflecting on Australia\u27s Seasonal Worker Programme (SWP), we make a case for the importance of maximising \u27development benefits for origin countries via the transfer of remittances, skills and knowledge\u27 (Bedford et al. 2017, 39; emphasis added). Remittances have been a regular area of policy and research focus. However, less attention has been directed towards the knowledges and skills that move with seasonal workers as part of this circular and temporary migration process-in which the choice is not reduced to one \u27between staying or going\u27 (Methmann and Oels 2015, 53), but both staying and going (often repeatedly). Here we draw on our own ongoing research with Pacific Island seasonal workers in Australia\u27s horticultural sector, which points towards the potential for the SWP to facilitate the bi-directional transfer of horticultural knowledges and skills.2 Many seasonal workers have extensive farming experience developed in their countries of origin. Acknowledgement of their farming skills and identities prompts contemplation of how the horticultural knowledge transfers that already happen spontaneously under the SWP could be better supported

Landscape Preferences, Amenity, and Bushfire Risk in New South Wales, Australia

This paper examines landscape preferences of residents in amenity-rich bushfire-prone landscapes in New South Wales, Australia. Insights are provided into vegetation preferences in areas where properties neighbor large areas of native vegetation, such as national parks, or exist within a matrix of cleared and vegetated private and public land. In such areas, managing fuel loads in the proximity of houses is likely to reduce the risk of house loss and damage. Preferences for vegetation appearance and structure were related to varying fuel loads, particularly the density of understorey vegetation and larger trees. The study adopted a qualitative visual research approach, which used ranking and photo-elicitation as part of a broader interview. A visual approach aids in focusing on outcomes of fuel management interventions, for example, by using the same photo scenes to firstly derive residents’ perceptions of amenity and secondly, residents’ perceptions of bushfire risk. The results are consistent with existing research on landscape preferences; residents tend to prefer relatively open woodland or forest landscapes with good visual and physical access but with elements that provoke their interest. Overall, residents’ landscape preferences were found to be consistent with vegetation management that reduces bushfire risk to houses. The terms in which preferences were expressed provide scope for agency engagement with residents in order to facilitate management that meets amenity and hazard reduction goals on private land

Transformative mobilities in the Pacific: Promoting adaptation and development in a changing climate

Climate change is affecting Pacific life in significant and complex ways. Human mobility is shaped by climate change and is increasingly positioned by international agencies, policymakers, and governments as having an important role in both climate change adaptation and human development. We consider the potential for human mobility to promote adaptation and development among Pacific people in a changing climate. We argue that where Pacific people choose mobility, this should be supported and create opportunities that are responsive to the histories and existing patterns of mobility and place attachment among Pacific Islanders; commence from a position of climate and development justice; and advance human rights and socio-political equity. Transformative mobilities are where mobility, adaptation, and development intersect to achieve the best possible outcomes for cultural identity, human rights, adaptation, and human development goals across scales and in origin and destination sites

Transformative mobilities in the Pacific: Promoting adaptation and development in a changing climate

Climate change is affecting Pacific life in significant and complex ways. Human mobility is shaped by climate change and is increasingly positioned by international agencies, policymakers, and governments as having an important role in both climate change adaptation and human development. We consider the potential for human mobility to promote adaptation and development among Pacific people in a changing climate. We argue that where Pacific people choose mobility, this should be supported and create opportunities that are responsive to the histories and existing patterns of mobility and place attachment among Pacific Islanders; commence from a position of climate and development justice; and advance human rights and socio-political equity. Transformative mobilities are where mobility, adaptation, and development intersect to achieve the best possible outcomes for cultural identity, human rights, adaptation, and human development goals across scales and in origin and destination sites

Las distintas movilidades de las comunidades en las islas del Pacífico

Los tipos de movilidad en las islas del Pacífico son varios y distintos. Los estudios de caso en la región nos permiten ver cuáles son las acciones y las voluntades de las personas, los hogares y las comunidades a la luz de una vulnerabilidad por cuestiones climáticas en rápido aumento

Linkages between flooding, migration and resettlement: Viet Nam case study report for EACH-FOR Project

This report provides the results of an investigation into the linkages between flooding and migration/population displacement in the Mekong Delta of Viet Nam as part of the Environmental Change and Forced Migration Scenarios (EACH-FOR) project. Viet Nam was selected as a country for examining the relationship between environmental change and migration because it is a country prone to water or water-related disasters (Sternin 2003), some of which are thought to be increasing due to the influence of climate change (IPCC 2007, Carew-Reid 2007). Moreover, a large portion of the country’s population is based in rural areas and is directly dependent on the environment for their livelihood (Adger et al. 2001). Additionally, in terms of migration, over the past twenty years the patterns and volume of rural out-migration flows in Viet Nam have been undergoing significant transformation (GSO/UNFPA 2006). This has primarily been due to the new opportunities generated by Viet Nam’s switch from a centrallyplanned economy to a more market-oriented economy with the introduction of the Doi Moi policy in 1986 (GSO/UNFPA 2006). Given these factors, this study hopes to shed some light as to how environmental change can interact

Agricultural change, increasing salinisation and migration in the Mekong Delta: insights for potential future climate change impacts?

This chapter focuses on the situation of some households from Nha Phan hamlet in Cai Nuoc District that have become more financially vulnerable as a result of the agricultural and environmental shift and thus have turned to migration as a means of coping. It reveals the complex pathways that link migration choices with changing environmental conditions. It explores how those impacts and choices are linked to human security and how the lessons learned from this study can shed light on climate change-induced migration. The chapter begins with a brief overview of sea-level rise projection for the Vietnamese portion of the Mekong Delta before discussing the switch to shrimp aquaculture in Cai Nuoc District and factors that affected whole-household migration decisions that were discovered during a study of households from that district

Editorial

In May 2016 refugees were, once again, brought to the forefront of an Australian federal election campaign. This has been a regular occurrence since 2001, when Prime Minister John Howard\u27s allegations that asylum seekers had thrown their children overboard helped to justify his government\u27s increasingly restrictive border protection measures. In 2016, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton raised a different set of concerns about humanitarian arrivals to Australia in response to the Australian Greens\u27 proposal that the annual refugee intake be increased to 50 000 people. Dutton\u27s assertions were two-pronged. First, many refugees are not \u27numerate or literate in their own language, let alone English\u27, and would \u27languish in unemployment queues and on Medicare ... there\u27s no sense in sugar-coating that, that\u27s the scenario\u27 (Bourke 2016). Second, Dutton warned, \u27These people would be taking Australian jobs, there\u27s no question about that\u27 (Bourke 2016). The fact that the two prongs of Dutton\u27s argument (unemployment and job stealing) directly contradicted each other is perhaps neither here nor there-both sought to emphasise (in the minister\u27s own words) the \u27huge cost\u27 of resettling refugees (Bourke 2016). As the media seized on these comments, The Guardian\u27s Ben Doherty and Helen Davidson decided to run a fact check. They brought a voice of reason into the debate-it was the voice of geographer Graeme Hugo AO