The People on Country research team all work at CAEPR, ANU in Canberra. Their work is in association with land and sea management groups in the Top End.

Jon Altman

Jon is an ARC Australian Professorial Fellow and a former Director of CAEPR. He first worked in central Arnhem Land in 1979-81 and has maintained vibrant and diverse research relations with this region for nearly 30 years. He has also undertaken field research in north Queensland, the Torres Strait, the Kimberleys and Central Australia. Jon's research interests are wide and include: Sustainable economic development and associated policy issues for Indigenous Australia; the economic engagement of Indigenous people with the Australian and global economies; sustainable commercial utilisation of wildlife and fisheries; and the Indigenous customary economy and its articulations with the market; land rights, native title and Indigenous land management.

Jon is presently working on a five year Australian Research Council Professorial Fellow project, 'Hybrid economic futures for remote Indigenous Australia: Linking poverty reduction and natural resource management' that is closely linked to the People on Country project.

Sean Kerins

Sean came to CAEPR at the end of 2007 to work on the People on Country project. For the last 5 years Sean worked at the Northern Land Council in Darwin. He was the Executive Officer of the Caring for Country Unit, assisting land and sea management groups in the NLC region develop land and sea management plans, secure funding and training opportunities and lobbying government to increase funding for Caring for Country projects. Sean has also worked for 10 years with Maori in New Zealand where he worked on sea rights. He has also worked with marine mammal hunters in the Faroe Islands in the Northeast Atlantic, where he undertook research on community-based management and use of Long-Finned pilot whales.

Emilie Ens

Emilie is an ecologist whose research to date has focussed on understanding the ecology and impacts of plant invasions with the aim of guiding land management practices. Emilie's most recent work, based at Charles Darwin University, has been on studying African grass invasion in savanna woodlands in the Northern Territory. Emilie's research assessed whether the more intense fires associated with the gamba grass invasion have led to canopy tree decline, and whether gamba grass has altered the hydrology of savanna woodlands. At part of that research, she also investigated various herbicide and fire weed control regimes.

Katherine May

Katherine has been with CAEPR since September 2008. Her background is in international development and prior to joining CAEPR she worked for three years as a project coordinator for an international sustainable development NGO based in London, working on projects in Ghana, Uganda, Alaska and the UK. Her research focus at CAEPR is on Indigenous cultural and natural resource management. Katherine has a BSc (Hons) in Geography from the University of Manchester and a Masters (with distinction) in Environment, Development and Policy from the University of Sussex.

John Hughes

John has been a publications and digital editor at CAEPR since 2003, and will be working in a part-time capacity on website development and publications to support the People on Country project.