• Integrate approaches from the humanitites (Archaeology), the social sciences (Human Geography) and the sciences (environmental analysis, remote sensing, GIS and IT) to address a conceptual and methodological problem
• Integrate research, management and governance in one project to create a new form of heritage monitoring system
• Systemise the application of participatory planning to site management
• Link participatory planning with GIS to develop a new method of representing local and regional concerns
• Create and implement a means to observe, appraise and manage the entangled relationship of heritage, environment, development and social life
• Produce a robust IT system based on portable, generic tools appropriate for maintenance in developing countries, freeing the national managers from dependence on the interest and commitment of outside agencies
• Provide an open system to which the contents of the separate - past, current and future - databases produced by other researchers and institutions can be connected over the long term
• Provide the first comprehensive, multi-scale, widely-accessible monitoring and information management system for Angkor - the first of its kind for countries of the developing world
• Bring the generation of map-based time series visualisation and analysis within the reach of non-specialists using desktop machines, through application of TimeMap, a Sydney University time-enabled GIS innovation with will shortly be released as an Open Source project.
  

The project will expand the pool of world-class Australian and international researchers who can work worldwide and possess:

• Experience in capacity building in relation to transferring knowledge and management skills
• Experience in passing on technical skills to developing countries
• Experience in the nature of development pressures at World Heritage Sites
• Experience in monitoring and reporting World Heritage Site status
• An understanding of heritage planning in another country.