CSIRO delivers ecologically meaningful, national-scale data, aligned with national and international frameworks on ecosystems and their services (measured in both physical quantities and monetary value). This website serves as a gateway to these data, available on CSIRO’s Data Access Portal.

We produce data on ecosystem extent and condition, biodiversity, and ecosystem services that:

  • is complementary, consistent and scalable
  • can support decision-making processes
  • will be updated as more detailed or mature data become available.
Find out more background information

Data and methods

Methodology for Basic Spatial Units – extent, condition, biodiversity and ecosystem services
Dataset for Basic Spatial Units – extent, condition, biodiversity and ecosystem services
An image that shows hummock grassland with boab trees (Adansonia gregorii) at the Devonian Reef Conservation Park, WA Credit: S Prober CSIRO

Ecosystem extent

Ecosystem extent is the size of an ecosystem asset. It is most commonly measured in terms of spatial area.

These data comprise the spatial extent of IUCN ecosystem functional groups at 250 m resolution for freshwater, terrestrial, marine and transitional realms for Australia (pre-1750, 2010-11, 2015-16 and 2020-21). 

The data are generated using national-scale input datasets for Australian ecosystems, along with additional supporting datasets.

A landscape image of a grey box gum and grain stubble, St Arnaud, Victoria Credit: S Prober, CSIRO

Ecosystem condition

An ecosystem’s condition shows how healthy it is over time. This is measured as the departure of a location in space and time from its reference condition.

These data comprise the HCAS 3.0 (1988-2022) base model estimate of habitat condition (250m grid), National Connectivity Index (NCI) 2.0, 3-year average annually rolling epochs of HCAS and NCI from 1990 to 2022, trends and other derivatives for continental Australia.

Wet lowland heath with Melaleuca, Howard Springs, Northern Territory. Credit: S Prober, CSIRO

Interpreting drivers of change in ecosystems

The Australian Ecosystem Models Framework is used to understand the drivers of change in ecosystems.

Spatial extent of the Australian Ecosystem Models Framework archetypes and ecosystem states at 250 m and 100 m resolution for Australia’s terrestrial ecosystems: 1988 to 2022 1988 to 2022.

An image of the Sentinel from the main range, Kosciuszko National Park. Credit: K Mokany, CSIRO

Biodiversity

Biodiversity is the variety of all living things. It includes differences within species, between species, and among ecosystems.

These data comprise spatial data and summary tables of predicted status of different biodiversity features across Australia over time.

Data are provided separately for 2 types of biodiversity features:

  1. nationally listed threatened species
  2. all native species in broad taxonomic groups (vascular plants, birds, reptiles, fungi).

The status of all biodiversity features has been estimated annually, for each year from 1990 to 2022.

An image of silver trevally, Pseudocaranx georgianus, Neptune Islands, South Australia. Credit: Alessandro De Maddalena , Stock photo ID:1452639416 (istockphoto.com)

Ecosystem services

Ecosystem services are the contributions of ecosystems to the benefits that are used in economic and other human activity.

Data are provided for 2 ecosystem services: irrigated agricultural water supply services and fisheries biomass provisioning services. More will be added as they become available.

Irrigated agricultural water supply services: These data comprise spatial data (GeoTIFF 250m grid) of annual (financial year, 2000-01 to 2022-23) irrigated agricultural water use and irrigated agricultural land; data tables of irrigated agricultural water use by State/Territory; data tables of the amount of water supplied by different ecosystem types, and maps and charts. The information is provided as final and intermediate ecosystem services across Australia.

Fisheries biomass provisioning services: These data comprise information on both physical and monetary values associated with the ecosystem service by Integrated Marine and Coastal Regionalisation of Australia (IMCRA) region (Integrated Marine and Coastal Regionalisation of Australia Provincial Bioregions, IUCN Global Ecosystem Typology ecosystem functional group and a combination of both for 2000-01 to 2020-21