Submitting Data

The database has an open access policy enabling scientists, government agencies, communities and organisations to request data on marine debris in Australia for educational and research purposes. The data submitted is always owned by the contributor, however the Australian Marine Debris Database provides one place for all data to be housed, providing everyone involved in the marine debris issue one place to both access and submit data on marine debris.

Guidelines for submitting data

General

• Check your paper copy of the data and make sure you have all the relevant details ready for entry.
• If submitting data for the first time, navigate your way through the form and become familiar with the layout before beginning data entry.
• Do not close your submission form page until you have completed the form and clicked the "Submit Clean-up Form" button.
• Your data will be vetted after submission. In this process we check site names and organisation names against existing entries, if any, to ensure compatibility.

Your Contact Details

• Please enter full first and last name and a contact number or email address.
• Avoid using acronyms or abbreviations when entering an organisation name.

Collection details

• Follow the format (light grey text) for entering details in these fields.
• Fill in all the fields. If prompted to enter data in a field you do not have details for then enter a zero.
• The name of your clean-up site and the date of the clean-up (Start Date) are critical pieces of information in the database.
• There can be only one clean-up entry on any one day for a given site. If your group or class split up and fill in several data sheets for the same site, please consolidate these sheets into one and then enter the data.
• We may change the name of your site to match its existing name in the database or to conform to our site naming protocol (E.g. there are many Back Beaches around the country).
• If adding a new postcode area and local site name please provide as much accurate information as possible. This assists us in accurately locating your site for mapping purposes.

Entering Your Clean-up Data

• Click on the item category (e.g. Plastic Consumer Items). This will give you a dropdown list of the items as they appear on the paper copy of your datasheet.
• Clicking on "Additional Items" at the bottom of each category list shows all the remaining items in the category – for assistance in accurately identifying which category an item should go in, please download the Marine Debris Identification Manual.
• Use only whole numbers in the total column.
• Please do not enter zeros against items. Leave the total column blank if none of the particular item was found.Once you have submitted data to the database, please note that it will need to be vetted before being approved into the online database, so may not be immediately available.

We thank you for your support and contribution to the Australian Marine Debris Database.