Mine rehabilitation leading practice requires management to establish appropriate sustainable land uses and rehabilitated ecosystems. Unlike mine site landforms which are systematically designed engineering principles and codes of practice, there are no such ecological design principles or codes of practice. Here the idea that rehabilitated vegetation and ecological design can be derived from routine environmental observational data, statistical analyses and theoretical ecological (mathematical) models is explored.Much of the language of environmental rehabilitation and sustainability requirements described in the DMP and EPA (2015) mine closure guidelines are subjective which affect the competence and uncertainty surrounding mining proposals and their assessment. Consequently rehabilitated ecosystem sustainable closure objectives and targets (criteria) are also subjective and vary between different types of mines and biogeographical regions of the Mid-West and Pilbara, Western Australia. By contrast the guidelines inform the reader that rehabilitated engineered landforms are designed, created and behave in a predictable manner, while sustainable vegetation and ecosystems are only established.Unlike safe and stable engineered landforms which are designed and constructed to various standards and codes of practice. Central to the landform design is the ability to reliably forecast the geotechnical performance and uncertainty over return periods of interest (life of mine or beyond).There are no mine site vegetation and ecological design principles or codes of practice. However, statutory requirements demand that a mining proposal document contains information about the rehabilitation of the land to: (i) demonstrate ecologically sustainable closure can be achieved; and (ii) present reliable scientific and appropriate site-specific data and information. There is no mention of reliably forecasting the rehabilitated vegetation or ecological performance or its uncertainty.Consequently rehabilitated vegetation and ecosystem objectives and targets are subjective and may inexplicably vary between different types of mines and biogeographical regions of Western Australia.Effective ecological design rests on a proper understanding of three fundamental questions namely: (i) how do mine planning and operation decisions affect the final quality of rehabilitated ecosystems; (ii) how do different native species of the provenance regenerate and adapt to the rehabilitation areas, and (iii) how are the ecosystems going to change in the near term?To address these questions a system of mathematical ecological models is used to demonstrate if it is plausible to forecast vegetation parameters to meet the statutory requirements.It is envisaged the methodology will substantially improve near term (<100 years) rehabilitated vegetation design principles and quantification of sustainability, including numerical values for operation, or closure, objectives, targets and criteria. these results will also contribute to environmental risk management. citation:steedman, r k, mattiske, l and collie, t, 2019. progress in evidence-based design of rehabilitated vegetation on mine sites, in proceedings iron ore 2019, pp 563574 (the australasian institute of mining and metallurgy: melbourne).>