Undertaking research to blow the lid off this hidden crisis. Australia is the only developed nation on the list of the world's deforestation hotspots, according to a new report by WWF, previously known as the World Wildlife Fund. Without a liveable climate, the vulnerable ecosystems that sustain us, wont. According to Dr Taylor, the SLATs method gives a more accurate measure of tree loss and the WWF are calling for a standardised national system for monitoring forest cover in Australia. And around 73,285ha of thator a whopping 80%was destroyed for beef production. Your feedback has been submitted. State of the forests Australia's native forests occur in a broad range of geographic landscapes and climatic environments, and contain a wide array of mostly endemic species (that is, species found nowhere else) combining to form unique and complex ecosystems. Our biosecurity system helps protects us. An MCG-sized area of forest and bush is bulldozed every 86 seconds in Australia. Just over 49% of alerts have been in areas classified as high or very high risk. This threatens a tourism industry worth $6 billion to Australia. Unlike other states and territories, Queensland also has its own statewide annual land clearing monitoring program based on a method called Statewide Landcover and Trees Study (SLATs). Queensland has contributed half of Australia's deforestation since the '70s, primarily to make way for cattle ranching. The Queensland government's own data shows what a massive problem deforestation is in the state. State and territory governments have primary responsibility for forest management. To contact us directly phone us or submit an online inquiry, Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. A new report from the World Wide Fund for Nature names eastern Australia among 24 global deforestation fronts - the only developed nation on the list. Actual ESG: growth investing in change | Baillie Gifford, A year in wealth management - what it means for 2023, Nicki Hutley: Policy, the budget and risks for investors. View an interactive version of this map in ArcGIS Online map viewer. Investing in health and disease prevention is the best cure, Identifying potential risks of COVID-19 and modern slavery in supply chain, How smart approaches to decarbonisation can generate alpha. Carbon capture - real deal or "Hail Mary pass" technology? Of all its deforestation alerts, 85% have been within 4km of the predicted location. But critics say RFAs allow logging operations to bypass federal environment laws and often result in the habitat of threatened species being cleared without any environmental impact assessment. More than 90 per cent of that land was classified as reclearing, meaning it had been cleared at least once in the previous 30 years. The following map was prepared and published by ABARES: This map provides a detailed snapshot of the forestry industry, including the location of major wood processing facilities, native forest tenure, hardwood and softwood plantations, as well as roads and forestry ports: PDF [12.1 MB] and higher resolution version PDF [36.6 MB]. While Tasmania's area of land clearing is more than double the Northern Territory's, the total land area of Tasmania is only one-twentieth the size. Except where otherwise explicitly authorised, any material on this website which may be construed as electoral material or an electoral matter under any State or Commonwealth Law is authorised by M. Brennan on behalf of The Wilderness Society Ltd, 132 Davey Street, Hobart Tasmania 7000. WWF's new report Deforestation fronts: Drivers and responses in a changing world , names 24 locations across Latin America, Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia and Oceania. Australia has a total of 134 million hectares of forest, which is equivalent to 17% of Australia's land area. We can't protect nature and wildlife, safeguard human . These trees are not only the koalas' primary habitat but are also their main source of . But Dr Taylor said ultimately stronger laws are what drive down land clearing. On the Koala Coast, numbers are down by 80%. "As soon as the Newman Government came [into office in Queensland] and weakened the laws, in fact, in their own words they 'took the axe' to the vegetation laws, we saw a five-fold increase to just the mature forest being cleared in a five year period," he said. "Deforestation in Australia took a marked downturn from 2004 to 2009. Deforestation is Australia's hidden emitterlike adding 10 million cars to our roads. Today, bare land is worth more than the intact ecosystems that support our lives. This change is needed throughout the whole supply chain, from producers through to retailers, such as supermarkets and fast food restaurants. Text available under Creative Commons license. 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Additional references: State of the Environment report 2021, We recognise First Nations as the custodians of land and water across Australia and pay our respects to Elders past and present. Australias 2019-20 bushfires were too recent to be considered in the analysis which tracked 24 deforestation fronts from 2004 to 2017. reports, Plantation In a country of diverse landscapes, lutruwita / Tasmania stands a world apart. Australia has about 3% of the world's forest area, and globally is the country with the seventh largest forest area. The environment minister, Sussan Ley, declined to comment on WWFs new findings as she had not seen the report. The report says cattle ranching (the destruction of trees to create pasture for cattle) was by far the most significant driver of forest loss or degradation in eastern Australia. That's because of stronger laws coming into play in Queensland and New South Wales.". The lion's share of land cleared in Western Australia was for agriculture, horticulture and forestry. The southwest of Western Australia has been experiencing a long-term climate shift since the 1970s, which researchers have attributed to historical deforestation resulting in decreased rainfall. In WWF's new report Deforestation fronts: Drivers and responses in a changing world, published today, the deforestation . ('Primary' refers to forests 30 years and older. Why so low? Also like Tasmania, native forest logging in Tasmania has been a hotly contested issue. It stuffs our soil and water, suffocates the Reef, kills wildlife, drains our carbon budgetand leaves our towns and suburbs hotter and less liveable. In September, legally binding emissions reduction targets for 2030 and 2050 were set by Australia's House of Representatives as part of a Climate Change Botched leadership handovers can severely impair company performance. This map shows the location of National Plantation Inventory regions in northern Australia: PNG [1.0 MB], PDF [0.7 MB]. Building a case for rehabilitation funding as a climate solution. This time our 1-kilometre-wide piece of cleared land would stretch 318km, say from Canberra to just beyond Sydney. A new report from the World Wide Fund for Nature names eastern Australia among 24 global deforestation fronts the only developed nation on the list. (modern). WWF report finds area six times the size of Tasmania has been cleared globally since 2004. Below are the key maps from Australias State of the Forests Report 2018. With your support, the Wilderness Society recently launched a billboard campaign highlighting deforestation rates across Queensland, and the harm this causes to wildlife. We have also seen isolated cases of high-value Australian timber being illegally logged. Australia's native forests provide a range of wood and non-wood products that are used by Australians in their everyday lives. Throughout history and into modern times, forests have been razed to make space for agriculture and animal grazing, and to obtain wood for fuel, manufacturing, and construction.. Deforestation has greatly altered landscapes around the world. Australia's illegal logging prohibition laws Our analysis of the Queensland government's own land clearing data for 2018-19 reveals that approximately 92,718 ha of likely or known koala habitat was destroyed across Queensland in one year alone between 2018 and 2019. Because the analysis only covered up to the year 2017, it excludes the effects of the catastrophic 2019-20 bushfire season, with WWF saying the accelerating effects of climate change made the need for Australian governments to increase protections for wildlife and habitat more urgent. Land clearing rates rocketed after the axing of restrictions in Queensland and NSW placing eastern Australia alongside the most infamous places in the world for forest destruction, said WWF-Australia conservation scientist Dr Martin Taylor. Meanwhile, Australia continues to be compared with some of the worst offending countries in the world when it comes to land clearing. Rethinking ethics and code of conduct training, Key sustainability factors impacting business in 2022, From the courtroom to the boardroom: climate change risks and remedies, Why sustainability matters in real estate, Measuring sustainability performance: comparing an SDG score with ESG ratings, Deep impact: the next step in sustainable investing, We must approach public equities with an 'impact' mindset. The latest Queensland governments SLATS figures for the year 2019-20 shows: This most recent 2019-20 data was released on 16 December 2022. The biennial Living Planet Report, published this week, puts . The following maps of forests in northern Australia were prepared in 2019 by ABARES for an analysis by the CRC for Developing Northern Australia. That will not change until we see rates of destruction go down.. This was rooted in some flawed ideas about the biology of soils and the resilience of our landscapes.