Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

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Kin and Country – The Cape York Indigenous Conservation Agenda

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Mr. Gerhardt Pearson (Balkanu Cape York Development Corporation CEO), Professsor Tim Flannery (2007 Australian of the Year) and Ms. Tania Major (2007 Young Australian of the Year) introduced the Cape York Conservation Agenda at a public seminar yesterday, at the Shangri La Hotel in Cairns.

The Cape York Heads of Agreement, signed off on the fifth day of February 1996 between the Cape York Land Council (CYLC) and the Peninsula Regional Council of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) (representing traditional Aboriginal owners on Cape York Peninsula), the Cattlemen’s Union of Australia Inc (CU) (representing pastoralists on Cape York Peninsula), and the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) and The Wilderness Society (TWS) (representing environmental interests in land use on Cape York Peninsula), was of central importance.

As I understood the essence of the seminar, it was not so much that the negotiated resolution of historic conflict was being celebrated, but rather that the agreement had been effectively abandoned, leaving Cape York as the only region in Australia without an appropriate NRM Board.

I thought it was a shameful indictment on Australia (and particularly its self-proclaimed conservation sector) that indigenous representation of Cape York needed to introduce a conservation agenda at all. Indeed, the division of representative interest in the agreement reeks of racial arrogance. The ACF and TWS are merely representative of the popularist environmental lobby. Their environmental bona fides, compared with Cape York’s indigenous record, is hysterical. And yet, the division of representative interest is inscribed within the agreement.

A traditional owner took the opportunity to announce that his people’s consent for the declaration of substantial increases in National Parks was taken under duress, by processing requirements that rendered Native Title contingent upon the relinquishment of vast tracts of tribal lands to the state (with the open arms of the conservation sector).

Professor Flannery described Australia’s indigenous people as ‘professors of fire’ and encouraged them to pursue scientific knowhow, particularly in dealing with a landscape overrun with feral weeds and animals. He encouraged the economic potential of carbon sequestration and expressed a hope for indigenous Ph.D’s.

The very impressive Young Australian of the Year, Tania Major, spoke eloquently about the linkages between recovering from a generation of welfare bondage and entry to the real economy, in terms of cultural obligation and the necessary removal of perverse regulatory obstructions.

Gerhardt Pearson led the audience along a challenging pathway of historical wrongdoing and contemporary betrayal and yet he was still able to enunciate the generosity of a people who recognise the need for mutually respectful cooperation and co-existence.

The disposal of our heritage

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Douglas Shire Council (DSC) has authorised the public release of its Blue Hole Reserve draft Management Plan, which aims to create a reserve for community purposes at a site of global environmental and cultural heritage significance, at the centre of the Daintree Cape Tribulation rainforest.

The underlying objective, it would seem, is to commandeer a designated area for public swimming and other associated recreational activities.

The draft applies to a portion of land known colloquially as the ‘Blue Hole’ incorporating property on a diversity of tenures surrounding a deep pool situated on a bend in Cooper Creek. It is inextricably connected to Cooper Creek Wilderness within the Wet Tropics World Heritage Area, which is a pre-existing authorized provider of regulated public access to World Heritage goods and services, including recreational access to Cooper Creek on a user-pays basis.

Interestingly, Queensland’s Parks and Wildlife Service (the State’s principle land manager with over ninety-percent of the area) has opposed the formal sanctioning of such a facility on National Park, because of environmental sensitivities, cultural heritage values and legal liability.

Surely if the Queensland Government wants a venue for unrestricted public swimming in the Daintree Cape Tribulation region, then it should develop one or more, BUT PLEASE on its own lands; National Park in particular, declared for that very purpose and manageable under the provisions of the Nature Conservation Act 1992 and its various regulations.

Cooper Creek Wilderness is a working-model of private-sector management through best-practice ecotourism. It does not have the statutory authority that would allow for management of the public at large. Indeed, having signed a conservation agreement with the Minister for Environment, it is not permitted to allow the public at large to enter its Nature Refuge.

The site is also unsuitable for the proposed use because of its extremely important cultural heritage values to its traditional custodians as a birthing site and spiritual resting place for the unborn, since a time immemorial. As a requirement of the Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Act 2003, the proponent has a duty of care to take all reasonable and practical measures to ensure their activities do not harm cultural heritage.

The Cultural Heritage Report, prepared by Dr. Nicky Horsfall in November 2005, recommends that,

“The proposed reserve should be made to protect the natural and cultural values; it should not become a recreational reserve.”

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The environmental report for the draft, prepared by consultant biologist Dr. Robyn Wilson, states;

Dr Wilson observed during her site inspection that a large tree (Ristantia pachysperma) on the northern bank near the tributary, that was helping to stabilize part of the bank, had collapsed and was filling the northern end of the Blue Hole. Dr Wilson surmises that a fact that may have contributed to its collapse was people climbing this tree to access a rope swing. Access to this tree would have compacted the soil at the base, which was eventually eroded and washed away by floodwater.

This proposal to provide unrestricted pedestrian access for recreation will devastate Cooper Creek Wilderness, which was effectively expropriated of development capability when it was compulsorily inscribed within Australia’s Wet Tropics World Heritage Area, except for the highly regulated provision of public access to World Heritage goods and services on a user-pays basis.

For years Cooper Creek Wilderness has formally requested a seat at the negotiating table to develop a cooperative solution to a complex management issue across multiple tenures, but has hitherto been denied such an invitation. Providing free-entry, unrestricted public access to that which Cooper Creek Wilderness has been compulsorily regulated to provide on a user-pays basis, is unconscionable.

There is a very acceptable solution to this matter that doesn’t involve the destruction of Cooper Creek Wilderness, but it would seem the proponents of this draft are resolutely disinterested.

If, how or why biodiversity matters?

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The ever-changeable stalwart, La Pantera Rosa asked if I was game to open a new thread on ‘if, how or why biodiversity matters’?

Certainly, the challenge has been begging in many threads across a variety of subject categories. Quite recently I posted that a two-week old cassowary chick was savaged to death by marauding pig-dogs. At the same time, future prospects of the polar bear were under discussion. The former is a federally listed endangered keystone species with fewer individuals in its remaining population than there are Giant Panda in the wild; the latter, has purportedly 20,000 to 25,000 animals remaining.

Quite apart from the context of the two issues, not one comment was received concerning the cassowary, whereas the PB is still enjoying lively debate. Why is one species of greater interest than another in its conservation importance and what are the implications of these predilections for preferential concern?

Agenda 21 – Chapter 15.2: Our planet’s essential goods and services depend on the variety and variability of genes, species, populations and ecosystems. Biological resources feed and clothe us and provide housing, medicines and spiritual nourishment. The natural ecosystems of forests, savannahs, pastures and rangelands, deserts, tundras, rivers, lakes and seas contain most of the Earth’s biodiversity. Farmers’ fields and gardens are also of great importance as repositories, while gene banks, botanical gardens, zoos and other germplasm repositories make a small but significant contribution. The current decline in biodiversity is largely the result of human activity and represents a serious threat to human development.

15.3. Despite mounting efforts over the past 20 years, the loss of the world’s biological diversity, mainly from habitat destruction, over-harvesting, pollution and the inappropriate introduction of foreign plants and animals, has continued. Biological resources constitute a capital asset with great potential for yielding sustainable benefits. Urgent and decisive action is needed to conserve and maintain genes, species and ecosystems, with a view to the sustainable management and use of biological resources. Capacities for the assessment, study and systematic observation and evaluation of biodiversity need to be reinforced at national and international levels. Effective national action and international cooperation is required for the in situ protection of ecosystems, for the ex situ conservation of biological and genetic resources and for the enhancement of ecosystem functions. The participation and support of local communities are elements essential to the success of such an approach. Recent advances in biotechnology have pointed up the likely potential for agriculture, health and welfare and for the environmental purposes of the genetic material contained in plants, animals and micro-organisms. At the same time, it is particularly important in this context to stress that States have the sovereign right to exploit their own biological resources pursuant to their environmental policies, as well as the responsibility to conserve their biodiversity and use their biological resources sustainably, and to ensure that activities within their jurisdiction or control do not cause damage to the biological diversity of other States or of areas beyond the limits of national jurisdiction.

Australia ratified the Convention on Biological Diversity on 18 June 1993. The National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia’s Biological Diversity aims to bridge the gap between current activities and the effective identification, conservation and management of Australia’s biological diversity.

Barred frogs discovered on the brink

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Northern Barred frogs (Mixophyes schevilli) from Cooper Creek Wilderness

According to Brendon O’Keefe of the Australian, two new north Queensland frog species have been discovered on or near the mountaintops of the Carbine Tableland. They have been identified as Barred Frogs; Mixophyes carbinensis and coggeri.

Conservation biologist Michael Mahony of the University of Newcastle, expressed concern that the frog(s) faced two associated threats in the form of global warming and also the frog-killing chytrid fungus, which would flourish in increased temperatures.

However, Nomination of Wet Tropical Rainforests of North-east Australia by the Government of Australia for inclusion in the World Heritage List, argued the Australian frog family, Myobatrachidae is believed to have had Gondwanan origins (Duellman & Trueb, 1986; White 1984), with primitive species within these families found in the Wet Tropics bioregion in the genera Mixophyes.

So, have the two identified species distinguished themselves from ancestral stock through recent speciation or have they persevered undetected to science from their Gondwanan origins. Surely the distinction would have implications for their survival prospects through climate variation.

Market-based conservation for privately-owned Tasmanian forests

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In a joint media release yesterday, Federal Environment Minister, Senator Ian Campbell and Member for Braddon, Mr Mark Baker, launched the Forest Conservation Fund (FCF), under the $250 million Tasmanian Community Forestry Agreement.

The stated objective of the FCF is to protect up to 45,600 hectares of forested private land, targeting old growth forest and under-reserved forest communities, of which there will be a minimum of 25,000 hectares of old growth forest and up to 2,400 hectares of forest in the Mole Creek area.

Private landholders have been invited to tender for support for the long term protection of old-growth and under-reserved (under-represented on publicly-owned) forests on their lands, through mechanisms that include covenants and conservation management plans.

An additional $3 million boost for Tasmania’s ecotourism industry was also announced, with $1million earmarked to develop bushwalking and related infrastructure in the Tarkine area and $2 million for forest-based tourism infrastructure, including for forest reserves created under the Tasmanian Community Forest Agreement.

Tourism grants in the range from $100,000 to $500,000, are open to application from groups including tourism operators, local councils, land managers and conservation groups, as well as from private individuals.

Tasmanian conservationists have congratulated the Federal Government for its funding of eco-tourism in the Tarkine forest but are also urging the Government to consider the Tarkine for World Heritage listing.

The Minister agreed that the area is of high conservation value and advised that it is being assessed for National Heritage listing, with the assessment verdict due in another six to 12 months. World Heritage listing would be considered once the Tarkine is on the national heritage list.

[Read more…] about Market-based conservation for privately-owned Tasmanian forests

Indigenous funding for conservation

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ABC News Online reports that the Federal Government has doubled the funding under its Indigenous Protected Area program, from three to six million-dollars a year.

Twenty-two initiatives are currently funded to help indigenous communities run conservation programs on land covering 15 million hectares, or 6 per cent of Australia’s land mass.

At $5 per hectare, I wonder how this investment in public monies compares with the cost per hectare, within the publicly-owned protected area estate?

Federal parliamentary secretary for the environment, Greg Hunt, says “We weren’t expecting social impact but what we’re finding is when people are doing meaningful work in remote Indigenous communities, there’s been a decrease in domestic violence, a decrease in drug and alcohol and other substance abuse and an increase in social cohesion.”

No doubt the economic beneficiaries of recurrent funding on the public estate also enjoy the social benefits of employment in the name of conservation, but surely the greater challenge for Australia is the development of sustainable economies on indigenous communities that meaningfully revitalise traditional care for country.

The major difficulty, as I see it, is the environmental functions and mandates of government land management agencies are not regarded as business activities; therefore, they are not required to maintain competitive neutrality. The supply of environmental goods and services on public estate is heavily subsidised to provide the illusion of free or nominal-fee entry, excluding fair trade upon non-government tenures.

Australian Government’s Tourism White Paper states:

The tourism industry is only meeting half the market demand for Indigenous tourism experiences. International visitors are clearly interested in experiencing these cultures but, at this stage, our tourism industry has not been able to develop sufficient Indigenous tourism product to meet that demand. Visitors are particularly interested in learning, experiencing and interacting with Aboriginal people, with authenticity an important aspect of the experience. Germany, the United Kingdom, other European countries and North America show the strongest potential demand for Indigenous tourism experiences in Australia.

Tourism offers particular opportunities for Indigenous Australians. In many areas of regional and remote Australia it offers the prospect of a pathway to economic independence. A significant proportion of the Indigenous population resides in regional and remote Australia. Developing Indigenous tourism can provide much needed opportunities for employment, social stability and preservation of culture and traditions.