Native Vegetation Policy - Reversing the Decline in the Quality and Extent of Australia's Native Vegetation Cover
Senator the Honourable Robert Hill
Minister for the Environment and Heritage
Five years ago, the Governments of Australia set the goal of reversing the decline in the quality and extent of our native vegetation by June 2001.
This was an ambitious goal. It required turning around the trend, mindsets and policies of more than a century.
Clearly the goal has not been reached. The rate of land clearing continues to be high at over 400,000 hectares a year across Australia, and the condition of many areas of remnant native vegetation continues to degrade.
Endangered ecological communities and species are declining as a result of current land clearing, and also as a consequence of the fragmentation and degradation resulting from the past clearing of the regions in the south-west and the south-east of the country.
Yet the goal of turning around the loss of native vegetation must be pursued. Much is at stake: ecosystems that harbour our precious native flora and fauna; the soils and water that underpin the productivity of many of our farming regions; and important greenhouse gas 'sinks'.
The Commonwealth continues to lead and has strengthened its commitments to restoring and protecting our natural assets. We are extending the Natural Heritage Trust by five years and $1 billion to continue the good work of thousands of people and to build on the $1.5 billion already invested. Recognising that land clearing is the fundamental cause of dryland salinity, the Commonwealth together with the States and Territories are implementing the $1.4 billion National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality that commits all parties to, among other things, preventing land clearing leading to unacceptable land and water degradation. The Commonwealth is also pursuing many of the opportunities our vegetation offers to help us meet our greenhouse emission abatement commitments.
Over the past five years, the Australian community has been engaged in protecting and restoring native vegetation like never before. The Trust has supported over 300,000 people to protect and rehabilitate native vegetation on private land through programs like Bushcare. The Trust has been directly responsible for:
- Work on 600,000 ha of degraded land through re-establishment of vegetation cover and changes to land use, including establishment of more than 15 million seedlings;
- 12,000 km of fencing to protect remnant vegetation; and
- 5,000 km of fencing to protect waterways.
The Natural Heritage Trust and National Action Plan have and will continue to mobilise the enthusiasm of the community and support on-ground projects with grants, technical information and other incentives.
However, clearly this is not enough. Without effective state-based controls on land clearing - that is, a regulatory bottom line - these efforts, and the major private and public investments they represent, will be wasted.
Now, five years on with the experience of the Trust investment, all Australian governments need to maximise efforts to turn around the decline.
Our first priority must be to protect and rehabilitate our existing native vegetation to prevent problems or degradation before they occur. Protecting remnant vegetation provides multiple productivity, biodiversity and greenhouse returns. The diversity and function of our Australian bush is virtually impossible to replicate or fully restore once lost.
Revegetation is an important means of rehabilitating the landscape where there is no remaining native vegetation. Even so, plantations of exotic and native species cannot replicate the full range of functions of native vegetation. Furthermore, even the increasing rate of revegetation stimulated by the Trust is not offsetting the current large areas of native vegetation lost to clearing.
The collaborative efforts of the Commonwealth, States and Territories in the National Action Plan and the Natural Heritage Trust will achieve significant results. However, the key reforms needed to achieve the national goal are action by the States and Territories to implement comprehensive land clearing controls that:
- prevent all clearing and degradation of remaining native vegetation except where it is consistent with best practice native vegetation management, catchment management and regional biodiversity objectives;
- address all ecosystem types including grasslands;
- use a precautionary approach to assess the risk of degradation and biodiversity loss;
- include full monitoring, evaluation and enforcement;
- support management strategies to assist landholders halt the decline in the condition of remaining native vegetation; and
- protect all threatened species and vegetation communities.
This statement first sets out the Commonwealth's approach and achievements in pursuing the national goal, and then makes a call to action for the States and Territories.
Australia is one of the world's seventeen centres of 'mega-diversity' of plants and animals. Our native vegetation cover is a precious natural asset, essential for maintaining our native flora and fauna species, water resources, soils and greenhouse sinks. Its depletion and degradation threatens the long term ecological health and economic productive capacity of our landscapes. It also diminishes the cultural heritage values that are inherent in Australia's unique native vegetation.
While broadscale land clearing for agricultural and urban development is a critical threat, the loss caused by clearing is compounded by the degradation of remnant bush through 'death by a thousand cuts' of grazing pressure, insect attack, disease, weeds, salinity, firewood gathering and lack of positive management.
The Commonwealth, State and Territory Governments committed themselves, through the Natural Heritage Trust, to the national goal of reversing the decline in the quality and extent of Australia's native vegetation cover by June 2001. Under the Natural Heritage Trust Partnership Agreements, States and Territories have committed to prevent any clearing of endangered ecological communities, any clearing which changes the conservation status of a vegetation community, and any clearing which is inconsistent with the sustainable management of biodiversity at a regional scale. This follows a similar commitment in the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia's Biological Diversity, signed by all Governments in 1996, which stated that by 2000 Australia would have arrested and reversed the decline of remnant native vegetation.
Thus the commitment is clear, and there has been significant progress towards meeting the national goal in many respects through the programs of the Natural Heritage Trust and individual State and Territory initiatives.
But a national goal can only be achieved by national action.
The exceptionally high rate of land clearing in Queensland is still the single most substantial factor in the failure to achieve the national goal. The Queensland Statewide Landcover and Trees Study estimates that an average of 425,000 hectares of remnant and regrowth native vegetation has been cleared each year over the 1997 to 1999 period. Indications are that there has been little abatement in the rate over the subsequent two years.
The New South Wales rate also remains high. Although estimates vary widely, it has been claimed that clearing in that state may be as high as 80,000 hectares per year.
Tasmania has a high rate of clearing relative to its size, estimated at close to 16,000 hectares in 1999-2000, with over 60,000 hectares cleared since 1996.
The impacts of native grassland clearing and modification are unknown.
Landholders and community groups all over Australia are investing significant effort in planting trees and other plants in revegetation and forestry projects.
Over the life of the Natural Heritage Trust, the area of trees and shrubs planted on agricultural land is estimated to have risen from around 32,000 hectares in 1995-96, prior to the establishment of the Trust, to approximately 109,000 hectares per annum in 1999-2000.
However, the restoration task is huge. The total area of land revegetated is well below the area of native vegetation lost to broadscale clearing. For example, the area revegetated is considerably less than the area cleared each year in Queensland alone.
In addition, revegetation cannot substitute for the diversity of plants and animals lost through clearing. In almost all cases, replanted vegetation is a poor substitute for the natural complexity of the vegetation cleared and there is a net loss in vegetation quality. Revegetation can only be part of the solution in meeting the national goal.
The Commonwealth Government takes its national role seriously and has provided unprecedented leadership to ensure a consistent and effective approach to native vegetation management.
I am pleased to be able to say that many of the new directions I foreshadowed in my statement Bushcare: New Directions in Native Vegetation Management tabled in Parliament on 8th December 1999, have been progressed in both the Natural Heritage Trust and new initiatives. The Trust has invested substantially in regional capacity and progressed many incentives for conservation such as revolving funds and rate rebates. The government also introduced new philanthropy taxation measures last year. Investments made through the Trust are now more strategic, with an increased distribution of funds through devolved grants to strategic regional initiatives - over half of the Bushcare One Stop Shop grants are now delivered in this way.
The Commonwealth has invested more than ever before in pursuit of the national goal of reversing the decline in our native vegetation cover. It has done this through unprecedented levels of funding for vegetation management, and embraced its national leadership responsibilities through innovative native vegetation strategies and programs.
The $1.5 billion Natural Heritage Trust is the foundation of the Commonwealth's approach to conserving Australia's native vegetation, land, biodiversity, water resources and seas. The 1999 mid term review of the Natural Heritage Trust estimated that about 300,000 Australians had been involved in the Trust to that time. Many more thousands have been involved since.
The Trust has increased awareness, knowledge and skills in natural resource management, which are essential pre-requisites to achieving changes on the ground. Trust programs have provided increased community access to technical advice, training and education related to native vegetation management, and generated a land stewardship ethic.
The Bushcare program is the largest of the Trust programs and funds on-ground improvements to protect and enhance Australia's native vegetation, by working with community groups, land managers, industries and Government agencies. Since 1997, over $228 million has been approved under Bushcare to support more than 2,180 projects throughout Australia.
Bushcare provides much of its funding as 'devolved grants' to regional bodies and organisations such as Greening Australia to help deliver regional strategies. The share of 'devolved grant' funding has now increased to approximately half of total Bushcare funding. This trend will continue in the extension of the Natural Heritage Trust with a greater emphasis on regional funding and delivery.
Vegetation information on the Internet
As anticipated in my 1999 Ministerial Statement, the Commonwealth has made a range of vegetation information available to the community on the Internet.
The Bushcare web site at http://www.environment.gov.au/land/bushcare/index.html now provides extensive information resources including on Australian native vegetation and its management, the Bushcare program and how to apply for funds, project management guidelines, extensive lists of contacts and publications, and advice on various policy issues. The Natural Heritage Trust web site at http://www.nht.gov.au has additional information on applying for funds and other issues.
The National Land and Water Resources Audit, another program of the Natural Heritage Trust, is developing a comprehensive national appraisal of Australia's natural resource base. Information products produced so far and reports on progress are available at http://www.nlwra.gov.au/ which relate to the seven Audit themes of water availability, dryland salinity, vegetation, rangeland monitoring, agricultural productivity and sustainability, capacity for change, and ecosystem health.
Much of the data collected through the Audit is available to the public through the Australian Natural Resources Atlas web site at http://audit.environment.gov.au/ANRA/atlas_home.html. The Atlas contains an interactive Internet mapping tool that allows the data to be viewed spatially and queried, and provides links to other information such as reports, graphs and pictures. Additional information, such as vegetation coverage, will be added to the Atlas as it becomes available.
The Commonwealth has been working with all levels of government, industry and the community to further develop a comprehensive, adequate and representative National Reserve System. Acquisitions and conservation management agreements covering over 8.6 million hectares, including 3.6 million hectares of Indigenous Protected Areas, have been approved under the National Reserve System.
There are now a total of 15 Indigenous Protected Areas in Australia, with declarations in each State and Territory except for the ACT. These Indigenous Protected Areas are managed by their Traditional Owners working through community based Indigenous land management organisations. The development of Indigenous Protected Areas has brought together contemporary land management practices with the land management knowledge of the Traditional Owners to better manage these often remote biologically and culturally important areas. The Indigenous Protected Areas program stands as a significant Commonwealth achievement bringing together Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians to protect our biodiversity.
In addition, the Commonwealth and State's Regional Forest Agreements have added just over 2.8 million hectares of native forests to Australia's network of protected areas.
The Commonwealth has developed or supported a number of innovative approaches to vegetation management through its Natural Heritage Trust and greenhouse abatement programs.
Under the national Revolving Funds program, another Natural Heritage Trust program, the Commonwealth is engaging organisations to set up Revolving Funds across the country to secure land with significant wildlife and habitat conservation values. Based on the very successful Victorian Trust for Nature scheme, it will purchase land, place a conservation covenants on the land and then on-sell it to a landholder committed to conservation, with the proceeds re-invested to fund further purchases.
The Commonwealth has negotiated a contract with Western Australian state agencies and an NGO to establish a new revolving fund, and encouraged the establishment of conservation trusts in Queensland and New South Wales to administer revolving funds. Contracts are expected to follow in these and other states.
Local Government initiatives
The Natural Heritage Trust has supported a range of local government initiatives. There are more and more rural councils making excellent progress in the use of planning tools and mechanisms to conserve native vegetation. For example, the Coonabarabran Shire Council in western New South Wales received the New South Wales Award for Excellence in Environment, sponsored by the Natural Heritage Trust, for its Vegetation Management Plan. The Plan provides for better decision-making for the long-term management of native vegetation, by making a direct link with development control policies, the Council's planning scheme and on-ground management activities to ensure protection of valuable remnant vegetation.
Native vegetation as greenhouse sinks
Limiting the loss of native vegetation and increasing greenhouse sinks through revegetation and plantation establishment provide effective and practical means for Australia to reduce emissions to help meet its international commitments, as a critical part of a wider greenhouse abatement strategy. There are important synergies to be captured between reducing net greenhouse gas emissions, mitigating dryland salinity, protecting water quality and improving biodiversity conservation at a landscape scale.
The Commonwealth has committed $400 million to the Greenhouse Gas Abatement Program which is funding a range of major projects to deliver large, cost-effective emission reductions. Projects funded under the program include several regional revegetation projects that deliver multiple economic, social and environmental benefits.
Reducing the rate of land clearing in Queensland remains one of the most significant opportunities to address our greenhouse emissions. The Commonwealth has offered Queensland unprecedented financial assistance to implement an improved land clearing regime that would deliver substantially reduced clearing rates and a significant greenhouse outcome beyond that resulting from the existing Queensland legislation and reform commitments. In order to meet our greenhouse commitments, certainty of outcome is essential. The delivery of this certainty, and a sustained reduction in greenhouse emissions, can only be achieved through the implementation of state-wide caps on clearing of native vegetation.
The Commonwealth has examined the use of the tax system to remove disincentives and provide appropriate incentives for nature conservation on private land.
Philanthropy taxation measures
The Government has introduced several taxation measures to encourage philanthropy that will contribute to the conservation of native vegetation, and has amended the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997 to promote philanthropy and stronger partnerships between business and community groups. There are four changes that relate to gifts made to environment and heritage bodies from 1 July 1999:
- allowing tax deductions for gifts of property (including land) valued at more than $5000 by the Taxation Commissioner, regardless of when or how it was acquired;
- allowing five year apportionment of deductions for these gifts of property, where the donation is made to environment and heritage bodies;
- providing a capital gains tax exemption for testamentary gifts; and
- providing a new category of 'private funds' eligible to receive tax deductible donations.
Incentives to support conservation covenants
The Commonwealth has announced tax measures, which encourage private land holders to place native vegetation under the protection of a conservation covenant.
The Treasurer announced in June 2001 that the Commonwealth would remove disincentives in the capital gains tax treatment of any payment to a landowner as a consideration for registering a perpetual conservation covenant on land title.
The Prime Minister announced in August 2001 that any loss in the value of land as a result of entering into a qualifying conservation covenant without consideration would be tax deductible.
National Vegetation Framework
Since the 1999 release of the Australia New Zealand Environment and Conservation Council National Framework for the Management and Monitoring of Australia's Native Vegetation, it continues to be a vehicle for coordinated reform of native vegetation management legislation and regulation. It sets out best practice procedures for the management and monitoring of native vegetation and is implemented by Work Plans established by each of the Commonwealth, State and Territory governments. In February 2001 progress against the Native Vegetation Framework was independently evaluated. The Work Plans were assessed as to their appropriateness, effectiveness and efficacy for achieving long term sustainable native vegetation management. The independent evaluation acknowledged the significant achievements that have been made by all jurisdictions under the Native Vegetation Framework, but recognised that increased effort is required to achieve the national goal of reversing the decline in the quality and extent of Australian's native vegetation cover. All jurisdictions agreed to review and update their Work Plans to address the comments raised in independent evaluation and to develop strategies to link the Work Plans to the Native Vegetation Framework.
The Native Vegetation Framework was adopted by the new Natural Resource Management Ministerial Council in August 2001. The Natural Resource Management Ministerial Council also agreed that the next step is to translate the national outcomes of the Native Vegetation Framework into regional targets. The new National Framework for Natural Resource Management Standards and Targets being developed under the National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality, will provide the ideal platform for such targets.
Firewood collection and use
In 2001 the Australian and New Zealand Environment and Conservation Council endorsed the National Approach to Firewood Collection and Use in Australia. The National Approach responds to mounting scientific evidence that firewood collection, which is estimated to amount to some 6 million tonnes per year, is having a detrimental impact on Australia's native vegetation and wildlife. The firewood strategy encompasses several elements to make the firewood industry more sustainable, such as more information to improve polices and target actions, educating the community, introducing a Voluntary Code of Practice for Firewood Merchants, increasing protection for species threatened by firewood collection, encouraging a firewood industry increasingly based on plantations, sustainably managed forests and waste wood, and improving firewood efficiency and encourage alternative firewood sources.
The Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act 1999 supports the sustainable management of our natural resources. The EPBC Act promotes the conservation of biodiversity including native vegetation by providing strong protection for matters of national environmental significance. It provides for: the identification of key threatening processes; the protection of critical habitat; the preparation of recovery plans; threat abatement plans; wildlife conservation plans; bioregional plans; and conservation agreements; and the issuing of conservation orders. A number of threatened native vegetation communities have been identified for protection under the Act.
In April 2001 the Commonwealth also listed land clearance as a key threatening process under the Act, in view of the evidence that land clearing has been the most significant threatening process in Australia since European settlement. If land clearing is not controlled it will lead to additional species and ecological communities becoming threatened.
The Government has undertaken a major program to map the locations and habitats of protected species and communities. By using the best available technology, we have been able to provide interactive, on line access to the relevant data from all over Australia in a form that allows users, whether they be farmers, planners or researchers, to determine which protected species or communities potentially exist in their area. The Government has also produced guidelines to allow affected people to self-assess the likely impacts of their activities on protected species and communities and on how to refer an action for a decision on whether or not approval is required. Our reforms have also ensured a streamlined approach to decision-making on whether or not a Commonwealth approval is required.
The Commonwealth has re-confirmed and strengthened its commitments to reversing the long-term decline in the quality and extent of Australia's native vegetation, and to meeting the national goal in new initiatives.
The Natural Heritage Trust focuses on supporting community action, but many of the natural resource management challenges we face are of such scale and complexity that they are beyond the capacity of community groups alone to address.
The problem of dryland salinity is perhaps the most pressing. Salinization of land and water is a symptom of inappropriate land use and management, often over large areas and long periods of time. Recognising that land clearing in salinity risk areas is the primary cause of dryland salinity, effective controls on land clearing are essential. Solutions to dryland salinity are likely to require far greater changes in land management practices than we had previously anticipated.
Extensive areas are likely to need large-scale revegetation to help mitigate dryland salinity. Appropriate incentives and integrated delivery mechanisms driven by regional communities will be crucial to harness the investment and momentum necessary for the scale of revegetation required. These actions have to be directed at the catchment scale, beyond the individual property. Through new land uses, many involving more native vegetation and plantations, regions can develop more diverse economies, landholders can gain alternative income sources, and Australia will reap environmental improvements.
The Commonwealth, States and Territories have allocated $1.4 billion to the National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality. It is a plan for decisive salinity and water quality related action to ensure that our land and water management practices will sustain productive and profitable land and water uses and will protect our natural environment.
To date, the Commonwealth and all State and Territory Governments except Western Australia have signed the Inter-Governmental Agreement to implement the National Action Plan.
Commonwealth funding for the Plan is contingent on the States and Territories committing to implement the whole package of measures outlined in this Agreement, which includes policy reform relating to land and water resource management.
The Agreement commits the States and Territories to put in place controls which at a minimum prohibit land clearing in the 21 priority catchments and regions where it would lead to unacceptable land or water degradation.
The National Action Plan is a major shift in our approach to natural resource management. Its focus is on regional delivery, to address problems at the catchment or landscape scale rather than merely at the farm scale. Regional bodies will be funded to implement accredited integrated catchment management or regional plans. Continued funding of regional plans will be contingent on performance in meeting regional targets.
The Agreement also commits all parties to the development of standards on salinity, water quality and associated water flows by December 2001, and standards on biodiversity by December 2002. These are to be implemented through a National Framework for Natural Resource Management Standards and Targets which will include national outcomes and regional targets for natural resource condition, and a requirement for regional targets for native vegetation retention and restoration.
The integrated plans, initially developed and supported under the National Action Plan, will also be used to guide funding from other sources. The Natural Heritage Trust would fund biodiversity, sustainable land management, enhancing the capacity of people and institutions and other elements, and programs such as Commonwealth greenhouse programs are likely to support some greenhouse emission abatement activities under these plans. Thus the regional delivery model developed through the National Action Plan presents the opportunity for government and community investments to capture multiple productivity and environmental benefits.
Further, trials of economic and market-based mechanisms will be funded under the National Action Plan for several pilot regions. These are likely to involve 'cap and trade' systems for salinity and nutrients and the development of environmental credits, such as for carbon and salinity, and biodiversity.
The Government has recently agreed to extend the Natural Heritage Trust for a further five years and $1billion from July 2002 which provides an opportunity to build on this outstanding community action and improve the way the Trust operates.
The extension of the Trust will build on the success of the original Trust, using the lessons learnt from the mid-term review and extensive feedback from the community and other stakeholders, and will draw on the framework being developed under the National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality.
Delivery of the Trust will be simplified under a revised structure, which focuses on three strategic themes:
- the promotion of sustainable agriculture and natural resource use to maintain the productivity, profitability and the sustainability of these resource-based industries;
- the conservation of Australian biodiversity through the protection and restoration of ecosystems; and
- individuals, industry and communities equipped with skills, knowledge and information, and supported by institutional frameworks that promote the conservation of biodiversity and sustainable agricultural production.
These strategic themes will be addressed by four programs broadly covering land, water, vegetation and coastal and marine activities.
Trust investments in these programs will be delivered through National, Regional and or Entry-level Grant components. Overall, the revised Trust structure will progressively allocate more funding directly to regional organisations to deliver agreed outcomes that address the Trust's strategic themes. Investment priorities and outcomes for the Trust are being developed to reflect its strategic themes.
The Commonwealth will also look at ways of better securing its Trust investment to ensure an overall improvement in native vegetation management on the ground, by including requirements for institutional and policy reforms.
The States and Territories have made significant advances in relation to vegetation management over the past few years but clearly there is a long way to go in many parts of the country.
While a number of States have effective regulatory systems for land clearing in place, the main reason why the national goal has not been achieved is that many States have not contributed sufficiently to the national endeavour. The goal cannot be achieved as long as Queensland land clearing rates remain at current levels, and New South Wales clearing rates also remain too high. Significant improvements in other States and Territories are also required.
In calling for action by States and Territories to address their responsibilities for management of native vegetation, the Commonwealth expects any action to follow soundly-based science. Furthermore any action must also provide for effective consultation with those landholders likely to be adversely affected by decisions to limit land clearing.
It is the Commonwealth's position that where rights have been so removed that State and Territories must meet any legal requirements for direct compensation to property rights holders. This is a precondition before the Commonwealth would consider adjustment assistance.
There are a number of key required actions and reforms common to most jurisdictions. These include:
1. Reduction of land clearing rates, particularly in Queensland, New South Wales and Tasmania.
To protect the values and ecosystem services that vegetation provides, remaining native vegetation should be maintained in the landscape as much as possible. In a number of states the benefits of investment under initiatives such as the Natural Heritage Trust and National Action Plan addressing the protection of native vegetation are and will be undermined by unacceptable large-scale land clearing. This may require education and awareness raising so that communities - and governments - continue to value the importance of native vegetation in protecting environmental values and sustaining productive uses of the land.
2. Land clearing regulations should protect all threatened ecological communities and endangered species.
Without effective regulatory protection, threatened ecological communities and endangered species are at a grave risk. Many of these communities and species only exist in 1% of their former range before white settlement. All states need to ensure that no further clearing of these threatened communities and endangered species habitats occurs.
3. Land clearing regulations should address all native vegetation types, not just tree cover.
Native vegetation is more than just trees. Natural ecosystems are complex and varied, and also contain a range of other plants including shrubs, forbs and grasses. Land clearing regulations and management controls need to take a broader ecosystem approach, addressing all vegetation types including grassland, shrub land and grassy woodland, as well as woodland and forest. States also need to ensure that the full spectrum of native vegetation types is covered in mapping, monitoring and reporting activities.
4. The 'precautionary principle' approach has to guide clearing regulations and management controls.
Australia's Intergovernmental Agreement on the Environment (1992) signed by all States and Territories states that: "where there are threats of serious or irreversible environmental damage, lack of full scientific certainty should not be used as a reason for postponing measures to prevent environmental degradation".
Given the weight of evidence on the negative ecosystem impacts of clearing, the precautionary principle, requires that decisions on clearing should be deferred until sufficient information is obtained to demonstrate no unacceptable environmental impacts will result, including biodiversity loss or land and water degradation. Nevertheless, broadscale clearing continues in Queensland, New South Wales and Tasmania. All states need to ensure that every precaution is taken in assessing clearing applications, especially where insufficient information is available on the likely impacts of clearing on land degradation, salinity and biodiversity. The precautionary principle is not just a fine sentiment to include in policy statements - it is a guiding principle for actions.
5. Monitoring, evaluation, reporting and enforcement should be enhanced.
There is no consistent and efficient methodology for the monitoring and reporting of land clearing across Australia, although data from the National Carbon Accounting System, due for release later this year, may provide a national overview of Australia's vegetation extent.
Where monitoring is undertaken, there is an emphasis on monitoring vegetation extent only. The capacity to assess condition must be improved. Also, in some States, monitoring focuses on forest and woodland, not broader vegetation types.
While legislative frameworks may be sound in many States, these must be supported by effective monitoring of and enforcement of compliance with clearing approvals.
6. Greater support for management of remnant vegetation should be provided.
This is a significant problem in all agricultural regions due to a combination of fragmentation, salinity, dieback, overgrazing, lack of natural regeneration and weed invasion. Governments must provide appropriate support and guidance for positive management by landholders to protect and enhance remnants, and thereby prevent 'passive clearing'.
7. Integrated landscape planning for vegetation management
Governments need to ensure that planning for vegetation management takes into account the full suite of environmental values and the desirability to achieve multiple benefits such as enhancing biodiversity, enabling sustainable production, arresting salinity and improving water quality at the landscape scale. This integrated approach to landscape planning will achieve far better outcomes than for example a reliance on simple offset schemes, which allow revegetation to replace clearing, and generally fail to reverse the decline in the quality of native vegetation. Replanted vegetation is a poor substitute for the natural complexity of the vegetation cleared, and there is consequently a net loss in quality and biodiversity, as well as in ecosystem services. Remedial revegetation measures should ensure that like is replaced with like as much as possible.
Land managers and community groups across the country, with the support of Australian governments, have made considerable progress in the conservation and sustainable management of our precious native vegetation cover, but there is still clearly much to be done.
Land clearing remains the biggest obstacle to achieving the national goal of reversing the decline in the extent and quality of our native vegetation cover.
All State and Territory Governments must complete the establishment, implementation and enforcement of comprehensive native vegetation legislation that covers all tenures, all land uses and all vegetation types, and mitigates against all environmental risks.
Australian governments will also continue our work in improving native vegetation management and revegetation through joint national initiatives including the Natural Heritage Trust, the National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality, and the National Framework for the Management and Monitoring of Australia's Native Vegetation.
The benefits from effective and comprehensive vegetation management will accrue across society and the economy - including in the environmental, cultural, scientific, agricultural and urban spheres - and can continue to accrue to future generations of Australians.
The concept of 'inter-generational equity' means we are mere custodians of our precious Australian bushland for future generations. We must fulfil this responsibility.
Now is the time for all governments and communities to work together to create much more effective mechanisms to conserve our native vegetation. We must not shirk hard or difficult decisions and must show the necessary resolve to reach the national goal.