23 TWENTY TWO YEARS OF INLAND AQUATIC SCIENCE (1993 TO 2015) AND ITS APPLICATION IN QUEENSLAND: ACHIEVEMENTS, LEARNINGS AND WAY FORWARD CHOY, S.C. Thispaperreviewsthelasttwentytwoyears(1993to2015)ofinlandaquaticscienceanditsapplica- tioninQueenslandandassessestheachievementsandlearnings,andthenproposesawayforwardfor thefuture.Manyscienceinitiativesandprogramshavecomeandgonewithvariousdegreesofsuccess. Currently,thereseemstobeastrongfocusonshort-term,operationalneeds.Thereisverylimitedin- vestment andcapabilityinlong-termstrategicresearch, particularlytoaddressrecurringandemerging issues.Thepreferredwayforwardwouldbeamixtureofpartnershipapproachesunderpinnedbya strategicscienceplanandlongtermfunding.Theeffectivenessofsuchresearchandpartnershipmod- elsshouldregularlybeassessedfortheircostandbenefit. SatishC. Choy(satish.choy@griffith.edu.au), AustralianRiverInstitute, GriffithUniversity, Brisbane OLD4011, Australia. INTRODUCTION The aim of this paper is to summarize and provide commentary on the past twenty-two years of inland aquaticscienceinQueensland.Whilstsomesignificant freshwater fish and local-scale ecological studies were carried out in Queensland prior to 1993 (e.g. Arthington et al., 1983; 1992; Arthington & Pusey, 1993; Pollard, 1990) it was not until the National River Health Program (NRHP) was initiated in 1994 that a concerted effort went into establishing State-wide inland aquatic science capability by the Queensland Government and other research institutions. The NRHP was instigated in response to the 1000km long blue green algal bloom in the Murray Darling Basin during the summer of 1991-1992. The objective of the NRHP was to improve the management of Australia’s rivers and floodplains for their long-term health and ecological sustainability (Choy & Thompson, 1996). This program triggered not only nationally consistent monitoring and modelling but also a range of research and development programs (Choy et al., 2002a). Whilst the Queensland Government focussed on the development and implementation of a broad scale monitoringandassessmentprogramusingstandardised methods for macroinvertebrates (Choy & Alexander, 1996; Choy et al., 2002b), academic institutions such as James Cook University and Griffith University investigated the suitability and protocols for a range of other indicators such as fish and algae (Arthington et al., 1998a; Pearson & Connolly, 1998). Strong partnerships and collaborations were developed through Federal and State government funding and co-ordination by the Land and Water Resources Research and Development Corporation (LWRRDC). This included community-based educational and citizenscienceprogramssuchasWaterwatch. In 1994, the Queensland Government also embarked on the Water Allocation and Management Program (WAMP) which was later renamed Water Resource Planning (WRP). The environmental water allocation (i.e. water to be left in the waterways for the benefit of biodiversity, ecology, ecosystem services, etc.) had to be underpinned by science and this triggered a range of research projects into the environmental flow requirements of water-dependent ecosystems and species, and methods for determining environmental water allocations (Arthington et al., 1998b). Part of the fund from the NRHP was also allocated to research into environmental flows and then Land and Water Australia (LWA), successor to LWRRDC, had a dedicated program from 2001 to 2009 on environmental water allocation (Sinclair Knight Merz, 2007). RESEARCH ORGANISATIONS 1993 TO 2015 Prior to 1994 very little aquatic science was carried out by the Queensland Government agencies (Cook, 2012). The main activities were in stream gauging and physical-chemical water quality monitoring for “beneficial use” purposes and in_fisheries/ aquaculture. Of the universities, the main research centre was the Centre for Catchment and In-stream Research (CCISR) which carried out a number of