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WORLDWIDE FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS

ACTION ALERT: End Out of Control Australian Land Clearing!

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Forest Networking a Project of Forests.org

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http://forests.org/web/ -- Discuss Forest Conservation

08/07/00

OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY

Australia is famous for its Koalas, Kangaroos, and other plants and

animals; and is considered a "mega-diverse" country with some 10

percent of the world's species. But Australia has one of the highest

rates of current and ongoing land clearing in the world, with grave

and tragic impacts upon habitat, climate and sustainability. Land

clearing involves the removal of native woodlands, grasslands and

draining of natural wetlands for urban development, cropping and

grazing expansion, tourism development, and horticulture. Only 200

years after European invasion, Australia has the highest mammal

extinction rate in the world. Like the other World economic powers,

Australia likes to make international proclamations condemning

environmental non-sustainability of regional neighbors and others.

Given that in 1999 Australia lost some half a million hectares of its

native vegetation, the most of any over-developed country, our mates

in Australian government are in no position to preach to others.

Given the relatively small arable land-base and rising soil salinity,

Australian ecological sustainability is at stake--as well as the

legitimacy of environmental conservation in the Pacific/Asia region.

Below you will find a news article and an action alert from the

Australian Conservation Foundation. Please email the Australian Prime

Minister to express your concern.

g.b.

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ITEM #1

Title: Greens angered by approval to clear vast tracts of woodland

Source: Sydney Morning Herald, Copyright 2000

Date: August 3, 2000

By: JAMES WOODFORD Environment Writer

More than 2,000 square kilometres of woodland in NSW has been approved

for clearing since the enactment of the Native Vegetation Conservation

Act in 1998, a secret State Government ministerial briefing paper has

revealed.

This is an area 500 square kilometres greater than the Sydney

metropolitan area.

The details in the document were obtained by conservationists while

they were waiting for a meeting with one of the most senior

bureaucrats in the Department of Land and Water Conservation. It is

understood the paper was sitting on her desk and was read by the green

group representatives.

The department is under intense pressure from both the Government's

own vegetation advisory council and green groups to improve its

efforts on the control of land clearing.

Since 1998, more than 360 alleged breaches of the legislation have

been reported but there has not yet been a single successful

prosecution.

This week, a leaked letter obtained by the Herald revealed that unless

land clearing was reined in, NSW would breach agreements with the

Commonwealth on both greenhouse gases and biodiversity.

Yesterday, a spokesman for the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Amery,

confirmed the veracity of the report but condemned the actions of the

conservationists.

The spokesman said the paper was an unsigned draft that was to be

distributed to the director-general of the department and the

minister.

According to the report, between January 1, 1998, and June 30, 2000,

there were 203,354 hectares (2,033 square kilometres) approved for

clearing. This year alone, between January and June, clearing of

43,282 hectares has been approved.

Based on the new figures, the NSW Government has underestimated its

land-clearing approvals by about 20,000 hectares in both 1998 and

1999.

Even the new figures, however, mask the true rate of clearing, said

the executive officer at the Nature Conservation Council, Ms Kathy

Ridge. Ms Ridge was one of those who saw the draft document.

She said the true figure was probably closer to 4,000 square

kilometres because the paper did not take into account clearing under

exemptions in the act or unofficial clearing.

This would make clearing rates in NSW comparable to those in

Queensland, she said.

"We want to see some satellite imagery made available to the public to

show the true extent of clearing," Ms Ridge said.

A spokesman for the minister said vast areas had been protected by the

Carr Government, including 57,975 hectares under the Native Vegetation

Management fund and 400,000 hectares under Regional Forest Agreements.

He also said the figures did not take into account whether land was

thinned, cleared or ultimately not cleared at all.

"It's unethical and unnecessary to obtain figures in that manner," he

said. "There's absolutely no need for them to resort to any sort of

dirty tricks to get figures."

Today an environmental impact statement will be released into a

proposal to log timber from north-east NSW, which will be turned into

charcoal at Gunnedah and then used as fuel for a silicon smelter at

Lithgow.

ITEM #2

Title: Landclearing in Australia, your help is needed!!

Source: Australian Conservation Foundation,

http://www.acfonline.org.au/campaigns/landclearing/intro.htm

Date: July 31, 2000

"In Queensland, clearing approvals for leasehold land increased by

over 60% from 1998 levels, to 644,000 hectares in 1999. It is expected

that actual clearing rates on leasehold and freehold land also

increased significantly."

HELP STOP AUSTRALIA'S LANDCLEARING

Please read the following information regarding landclearing.

ACT NOW!!!!!

Write to:

* The Hon. John Howard MP, Prime Minister, Parliament House, Canberra

ACT, 2600. You can email the PM from his web site feedback page at:

http://www.pm.gov.au/your_feedback/feedback.htm

You can also fax the Prime Minister on 02 6273 4100.

Write to: Entsch, The Hon Warren, Member for Leichhardt at :

Warren.Entsch.MP@aph.gov.au

Cairns office, AAMI Building

140 Mulgrave Road, Cairns Qld 4870

(07) 4051 2220 (tel)

(07) 4031 1592 (fax)

Please use your own words, based on the information above and express

your personal opinion and concerns on land clearing to John Howard and

Warren Entsch.

Please send a copy of your letter or fax to us at ACF: Australian

Conservation Foundation, 340 Gore Street, Fitzroy Vic, 3065. Fax: 03

9416 0767. or email c.sherwin@acfonline.org.au

For more information on the issue check out ACF's website on:

http://www.acfonline.org.au/campaigns/landclearing/intro.htm

Help stop LAND CLEARING

Take Australia off the International blacklist

Background

Australia is famous for its Koalas, Kangaroos, other marsupials,

plants and animals, many of which are found nowhere else on earth. It

is one of only 12 countries to be recognised by scientists as "mega-

diverse" and, in fact, nearly 10 percent of the world's animal, bird,

plant and microbe species live in Australia. Most of these are found

nowhere else on earth.

But Australia has one of the highest rates of land clearing in the

world and the effects of this habitat destruction on Australian

wildlife are catastrophic. In just 200 years since European

settlement, Australia has reached the highest rate of mammal

extinction in the world and almost half of our marsupial species are

either extinct or threatened.

Recent data suggests that Australia cleared over half a million

hectares of its native vegetation in 1999 (an estimated 529,200

hectares, 400,000 of which was in Queensland). On available figures,

this rate is outpaced by only four other countries in the world:

Brazil (2,554,400ha), Indonesia (1,084,400ha), Congo (740,200) and

Bolivia (581,400ha).

Between one and two football fields of bush is being bulldozed every

minute of each day.

It is not just species which are threatened with extinction - entire

ecosystems of native plants and animals are being obliterated by land

clearing. This places Australia in breach of the international

Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). As a contracted party the

CBD requires us to develop or maintain necessary legislation and/or

other regulatory provisions for the protection of threatened species

and populations, and to promote national arrangements for emergency

responses to activities or events which present a grave and imminent

danger to biodiversity.

Land clearing also has serious impacts on human communities.

Removal of bush is causing salty groundwater water to rise, causing

salt scalds, rising salinity levels in rivers, reduced farm

productivity, damage to roads, buildings and other infrastructure in

towns and cities, and plummeting drinking water quality in many areas.

Land clearing is also estimated to contribute about 13% of Australia's

greenhouse pollution, through the rotting and burning of millions of

tonnes of vegetation.

This is in breach of article 2 of the Kyoto Protocol to the Convention

on Climate Change which provides that parties shall promote

sustainable forms of agriculture in light of climate change

considerations (most clearing is for agriculture), and protection and

enhancement of sinks and reservoirs of greenhouse gasses.

Prime Minister John Howard will soon decide whether to provide funding

support to help Queenslanders control land clearing.

What Can be Done to Stop Land Clearing in Australia

The Australian Government must accept its responsibility to protect

farm productivity, wildlife and rural communities and fulfil its

international treaty obligations.

You can help by writing to Prime Minister John Howard, expressing your

concern about land clearing and associated land degradation,

biodiversity decline and greenhouse emissions and urging him to take

the following actions:

" Provide immediate financial support to assist with the introduction,

implementation and monitoring of proper clearing control legislation

in Queensland, prohibiting clearing of vegetation types classified as

"of concern".

" Include land clearing as a matter of national environmental

significance, triggering Federal Government action, in the new

Environment Protection & Biodiversity Conservation Act;

" Ensure that binding, enforceable clearing control legislation is

introduced across all jurisdictions and all land tenures in Australia.

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