Natural Heritage - Number 14
The Journal of the Natural Heritage Trust
Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry Australia
Environment Australia, Summer 2003
ISSN 1440-7256
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About this document
The central theme for this issue of the Natural Heritage Journal is salinity – the Coalition Government's number-one natural resource management priority, and an issue that is high on the list of the Government's priorities overall.
As mentioned in the previous issue of Natural Heritage, community action with support from the Australian Government Envirofund has been outstanding. The list of successful projects receiving money under the first round of grants is included with this issue. In addition, the Coalition Government has recently announced a special round of funding acknowledging the effect the drought is having on natural resource management. $10 million is available for community projects of up to $30,000 each to specifically address drought-related environmental challenges. More information about applications may be obtained by telephoning 1800 065 823.
This journal also highlights a range of projects addressing threats and pests, another area where the Government is supporting communities to take positive on-ground actions.
There's no doubt salinity is a major natural resource management challenge. According to the National Land and Water Resources Audit, nearly six million hectares of Australia's farmland now have a high potential to develop dryland salinity problems.
By 2050, the Audit suggests, the threat could be up to 17 million hectares. But it is not just our immensely important and valuable farming and grazing lands that are at risk of loss of productivity and environmental degradation from salinity.
The Audit also warned us that some 19,800 kilometres of roads, 1,600 kilometres of railways, 11,800 kilometres of streams and lake frontages, 306 towns, 80 important wetlands, and two million hectares of native vegetation, are also at high risk.
The potential long term cost to the productivity of land, to the environment, and to infrastructure from salinity could therefore dwarf the current estimated annual cost of $300 million.
One of the very great challenges associated with the war on salinity is simply to accept that we need to undertake major spending, and engage in a major effort now, to deal with a problem that may not become a reality for decades.
Australia's land managers and governments have now made that commitment.
The Commonwealth and the States have joined forces through the Prime Minister's $1.4 billion National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality to significantly expand the effort to combat salinity.
Governments alone, however, cannot solve this problem.
That will require the commitment of Australia's front-line land managers and the articles in this issue of the Natural Heritage Journal show they are meeting the challenge.
Salinity is a major threat. The articles presented here show that with ongoing support from all tiers of government, and all tiers of the community, we can manage it and, in many cases, beat it.
There is no more important natural resource management undertaking underway in Australia.
Dr David Kemp
Minister for the Environment and Heritage
Warren Truss
Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry
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