DRAFT NATIONAL WILDLIFE CORRIDORS PLAN
SUBMISSION BY THE OFFICE OF ENVIRONMENT AND HERITAGE NSW
Overview
The general rationale and objectives outlined for the draft NWC Plan are consistent with
current thinking and experience in implementation of large scale corridors. For example, the
draft NWC Plan recognises the role of corridors in supporting species migrations and
adaptation consistent with the findings of work co-commissioned by New South Wales
(Mackey et al., 2010).
However, the specific detail of how aspects of the draft NWC Plan would be implemented is
less clear, and in the case of proposed legislation have the potential to undermine the
success of existing corridors. The introduction of legislation is not supported. Areas that
warrant particular consideration include clarification of funding arrangements to leverage
cross-sector and cross-regional involvement, purchase and establishment of new protected
areas within corridors, and voluntary management of private lands to enhance connectivity
and function within identified corridors and the wider landscape.
Links with NSW biodiversity and corridor initiatives
Most ecosystems in NSW have been impacted by varying degrees of habitat loss.
‘Connectivity conservation’ and the management of effective and well-planned wildlife
corridors provides an important strategy to support species persistence and adaptation to
future landscape-scale pressures. Corridors alone will not achieve this, but should be
recognised as an essential complement to other approaches such as the National Reserve
System, natural resource management planning and investment, threatened species
recovery and threat abatement.
The Australian Government is encouraged to build on existing programs and progress in
NSW to ensure effective and timely delivery of a NWC Plan. Recent developments which
provide such opportunities include:
$40 million committed by the NSW Government to develop a network of ‘green corridors’
across the state. This includes provision for strategic reserve acquisitions, grants to local
government and community groups to develop local corridors in Western Sydney and
elsewhere in NSW. These largely local efforts would strongly complement efforts supported
by the NWC Plan to encourage collaboration across jurisdictions.
The ‘Green Corridors’ commitment includes the NSW Government announcement in
December 2011 of $4.4 million to support efforts by the Great Eastern Ranges (GER)
Initiative to establish a wildlife corridor along eastern Australia, in collaboration with partners
from Queensland, Victoria and the ACT. Significant opportunities exist to translate the
success in landholder and broader community participation in the GER corridor to other
landscapes in Australia.
Development of an updated NSW Biodiversity Strategy has commissioned spatial analysis of
biodiversity benefits from native vegetation management. These analyses include state-scale
modeling of habitat connectivity as the basis for guiding efforts to maintain existing
connections between protected areas, and strengthen narrow or degraded connections.
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Submission by the Office of Environment and Heritage NSW
Catchment Management Authorities (CMAs) in NSW have commenced work to update and
enhance their Catchment Action Plans (CAPs). It is expected that the upgraded CAPs will
incorporate consideration of ecosystem resilience, and provide an opportunity to develop
‘climate ready’ targets and regional programs which include rehabilitation of connectivity
through development of wildlife corridors as an important strategy in conserving native
species.
These initiatives reinforce the intent of the draft NWC Plan by helping to:
guide investment in strategic wildlife corridors to protect and restore habitat in the areas
which are most important for supporting species persistence and adaptation;
link existing efforts by agencies, CMAs, non-government organisations (NGOs), private
individuals and others to maintain biodiverse carbon stores to complement the development
of a network of national wildlife corridors;
provide guidance to agencies, industry, CMAs and others on how to integrate development
of wildlife corridors into CAPs and investment programs, and related implementation
activities;
provide a framework for broad community involvement in collaborative corridor projects
which support the essential ecological processes needed to ensure native species are able
to adapt to changing land use patterns and climactic conditions; and
support progress in development of approaches to monitoring progress in corridor
management to enhance connectivity, in conjunction with other state, regional and local
environmental reporting processes.
Proposed Wildlife Corridors Act
The proposed development of a new Wildlife Corridors Act, or alternatively amending other
existing legislation to achieve the intent of designating corridors, has potential to generate
community confusion in relation to the voluntary nature of such areas.
The introduction of such legislative provisions would undermine a major strength in the
successful evolution of corridor projects to date; specifically the voluntary nature of
involvement by both landholders and the organisations with whom they work. The
introduction of legislation is not supported. It is likely to undermine the community-driven,
cross tenure collaborative nature of connectivity conservation initiatives. This would be
counter productive.
Criteria for designating ‘National Wildlife Corridors’
The draft NWC Plan clearly intends to establish criteria as the basis for evaluating proposals
for wildlife corridors made by the community. The Australian Government’s expectations of
criteria such as scale, purpose and design, governance and implementation will greatly
influence the number and quality of proposals likely to be brought forward for consideration.
Consultation on the criteria and their expression of the NWC Plan intent for designated
national corridors should be made available and open to community comment as soon a
practicable.
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Submission by the Office of Environment and Heritage NSW
Corridors are commonly identified at a continental scale as broad ‘brush strokes’ across
landscapes that inevitably include a diversity of land uses, including modified lands used for
primary production, urban and residential uses and resource projects. Any criteria for
designating a national wildlife corridor needs to clearly allay any community perceptions that
all lands within these broad ‘brush strokes’ are proposed for conservation.
Scale and national wildlife corridors
It is not clear in the draft NWC Plan how local and regional scale corridors might qualify as
‘national’ corridors with multiple regions addressing connectivity at multiple scales to address
ecological processes. The draft NWC Plan correctly highlights the importance of developing
corridors at national, regional and local scales to address ecological processes at multiple
scales.
The draft NWC Plan establishes the expectation that it will identify corridors which exist at
the continental scale, and particularly that it will help to support initiatives which involve
multiple regions, States and Territories. This impression is strengthened by the intention to
allow community to nominate proposed ‘National Wildlife Corridors’. However, the
relationship between scales of corridor activity are unclear and require further clarification of
whether the draft NWC Plan is intended as a national plan for corridors at all scales, or a
national plan for corridors which includes provision for corridors at national scale.
Information to support corridor planning and design
The draft NWC Plan correctly asserts the importance of “design and location of corridors…
based on the best available information”. OEH, along with Catchment Management
Authorities, local government, NGOs and others in NSW have invested significant effort in
developing spatial techniques and analyses that would support implementation of a NWC
Plan in conjunction with existing and future regional and local efforts. The Australian
Government is encouraged to more fully explore the data, techniques and information
available and how this might be made more accessible to the community and implementation
projects as part of the implementation of the NWC Plan.
Indigenous cultural heritage
The strong recognition of relationships between traditional owners’ use of the landscape and
existing and potential wildlife corridors is welcome. Indigenous protected areas, traditional
knowledge and efforts to maintain or reconnect with country should be given a strong
emphasis in any efforts to involve the indigenous community in biodiversity conservation
through implementation of a NWC Plan. Facilitating such involvement is likely to require a
slightly different set of mechanisms and support compared to other aspects of investment in
corridor initiatives. For example, capacity building programs to enable traditional owners to
link indigenous protected areas and other indigenous-owned lands as part of a network of
natural areas comprising wildlife corridors. This will require resourcing and commitment to
processes which empower and build community involvement into the future.
The draft NWC Plan gives recognition of social aspects of connectivity conservation, and
correctly emphasises the importance of collaboration and the importance of helping to place
individuals’ efforts in the context of a wider social endeavour. Connectivity conservation
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Submission by the Office of Environment and Heritage NSW
places as much emphasis on linking human communities and endeavours as it does on
linking habitats of formative species.
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Submission by the Office of Environment and Heritage NSW
Invasive species and wildlife corridor design
The draft NWC Plan highlights the potential for corridors to increase the potential for spread
of invasive species. While the importance of managing the risk of invasive species is noted,
the plan should more clearly express the role of management of invasive species as a direct
contribution to improving connectivity.
Despite an extensive scientific literature on connectivity and ‘corridors’, there remains
surprisingly little data to demonstrate a direct relationship between connectedness of habitat
and rates of dispersal and invasion by introduced species. However, four key principles are
apparent:
The presence of introduced species in ‘corridors’ derives in large part from the disturbed and
fragmented landscapes in which they occur.
Connectivity is essential for ensuring the more rapid movement and recolonisation of
available habitat by native species within an otherwise fragmented landscape.
Increased landscape-scale connectivity may assist the movement and spread of introduced
species (particularly weeds) in certain circumstances, but is less significant than site
disturbance and degraded condition in facilitating invasions.
Native vegetation in good condition can present a more resistant barrier to colonisation by
introduced species, but not in all cases.
To assist with avoiding risks from introduced species, and mitigating impacts where
rehabilitation involves their containment or suppression, connectivity programs should be
designed to accommodate the following:
Connectivity projects involving the rehabilitation of native vegetation should embed the
suppression of introduced species as an explicit objective from the outset, as part of an
holistic and ongoing approach to site management.
Connectivity projects should be allocate funds to long term suppression and management of
weed and feral animal populations, and management of disturbance factors (grazing, overly
frequent burning, infrastructure management practices, etc) that assist their invasion.
Re-vegetation and ongoing site management of ‘corridor’ areas should be balanced with
eradication, containment and asset protection in the core habitat areas being connected.
Additional connectivity themes for exploration
The draft NWC Plan should consider additional connectivity themes to present a more
comprehensive overview of wildlife corridors. Several themes present opportunities for
further thinking and emphasis to reflect a more complete coverage of the plan:
Ephemeral wetland networks - The role of wetlands in contributing to connectivity of
ecological processes and species populations at global and continental scales.
The draft recognises the role of national corridors in supporting trans and inter
continental migrations. Further information on patterns of migration at this scale, and
particularly the location of major wetland systems and areas which are critical to
supporting these movements would provide a useful complement to the mapping
information included.
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Submission by the Office of Environment and Heritage NSW
Riverine corridors – Australia’s rivers, riparian vegetation and aquatic ecosystems support
the seasonal and post-disturbance migration and dispersal of a large proportion of Australia’s
native species. The impacts of dams, weir and irrigation projects, changed flow regimes and
other changes to riparian vegetation should be considered as an expansion on the
recognition s of “ecological pathways”, and their importance in supporting maintenance of a
number and protection of drought refuge areas.
Marine connectivity - Connectivity within the marine environment is not explored. Similarly
interactions between and across marine and coastal environments.
Connectivity across and within agricultural landscapes – Connectivity of woodland
environments within predominately agricultural regions is an issue of concern which will
benefit from connectivity conservation initiatives. Analysis of seasonal bird migrations in
eastern Australia by Birdlife Australia (Smith, 2010; Howling et al., 2011) highlights the role of
the network of forested woodland remnants comprising the 'Western Woodlands Way' in
supporting latitudinal migrations in conjunction with the natural flyway provided by the
eastern ranges.
In NSW, traveling stock reserves and other linear reserves such as roadside
environments provide critical connectivity across and within agricultural landscapes and
are characterised by the presence of Endangered Ecological Communities and
threatened species. In areas such as the sheep-wheat belt these areas are often the best
examples of remnant native vegetation and can provide a foundation for connectivity at
all scales.
Funding and leveraging cross-sector involvement
The draft NWC Plan infers that existing funding programs, such as Caring For Our Country,
will be oriented to achieve the outcomes and thinking outlined in the plan. This message has
been reiterated in consultation meetings hosted by the National Wildlife Corridors Plan
Advisory Group. However, the plan could benefit from a clearer statement of the nature of
overlaps between existing programs and how these might be realigned to more expressly
accomodate connectivity outcomes in conjunction with other landscape management issues.
The draft NWC Plan correctly recognises the important contributions that non-government
sectors can make towards achieving improved connectivity in identified corridors. Existing
initiatives such as the GER Initiative have proved highly successful in engaging contributions
from sectors other than the traditional conservation or Natural Resource Managment sectors.
This holistic approach to collaboration and participation is essential to mobilise a broad range
of skills and capacities, and ensure commitment to maintaining outcomes is achieved in the
long term.
The role of existing corridor initiatives in catalysing cross-regional and cross-jurisdictional
collaboration is inferred in the plan, but should be emphasised more strongly. Australian and
international experience demonstrates the importance of community vision for iconic large
scale corridors in transcending organisations, regions and sectors of society. Administrative
boundaries and governance arrangements formed within existing structures are not well
suited to progressing a vision which reaches far beyond the boundaries and mandate of
single organisations, and calls for partnership and collaboration across community, nongovernment and government sectors.
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Submission by the Office of Environment and Heritage NSW
Governance arrangements established for programs such as Habitat 141, the GER Initiative
and Gondwanalink provide an important model which demonstrates regional NRM bodies
operating on equal footing with other non-government and community-based participants.
For this reason, OEH supports the unique catalysing, connecting and coordinating role of
enterprises such as the GER Initiative and would encourage the NWC Plan to invest funding
through these entities to support cross-regional delivery, as well as through NRM bodies,
community groups and NGOs.
Potential national wildlife corridors in NSW
The inclusion of the GER Initiative as an ‘existing’ national corridor is welcomed. However,
the draft NWC Plan mistakenly describes the GER Initiative as existing within NSW alone.
Whilst GER has been initiated in NSW, further development of cross-border partnerships and
collaborations has been pursued in seeking to achieve its vision to link natural areas for
3,600 km along the eastern ranges from the Grampians in central west Victoria, through ACT
and NSW to tropical far north Queensland.
Progress towards achieving this goal includes:
confirmation of the scientific basis for the national GER corridor by Mackey et al. (2010) in a
report commissioned by NSW, Victoria, Queensland and ACT with peer review
commissioned by the Australian Government;
active involvement of regional organisations from Victoria, Queensland and ACT in the
Kosciuszko to Coast, Slopes to Summit and Border Ranges partnerships of the GER;
active delivery of a growing portfolio of GER-focused projects activities in each of the four
jurisdictions in eastern Australia by national and interstate NGOs involved as affiliates within
the GER Initiative (e.g. Conservation Volunteers Australia, OzGREEN, Trust for Nature
Victoria); and
continued progress towards cross-jurisdictional collaboration between NSW and other States
on supporting implementation by Government agencies and NGOs.
It is essential that the draft NWC Plan acknowledges the considerable investment and
progress made towards implementing the GER Initiative in other jurisdictions. OEH requests
that material within the draft NWCP which describes the GER Initiative be corrected to reflect
the contributions to the corridor already being made by organisations in Victoria, ACT and
Queensland.
Recognition of the NSW component of the Habitat 141 corridor is also noted. This important
tri-state initiative provides an opportunity to complement the involvement of NRM bodies,
community groups and non-government organisations from the three states by ensuring long
term security of links between the semi-arid landscapes of western NSW and the continent's
south coast.
OEH continues to collaborate with adjacent jurisdictions to explore opportunities to enhance
linkages between States’ and Territories’ respective corridor projects. For example, CMAs
and agencies from NSW and ACT have recently expressed strong support for cross-border
collaboration to link local corridor projects around the southern ranges. The proposed
Southern Tablelands Flyway would enhance migratory pathways between the Australian
Alps and inland woodlands of NSW, which in turn comprise the Western Woodlands Way
initiative mentioned above.
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Submission by the Office of Environment and Heritage NSW
The inclusion of proposed new 'pilot' corridors in the Edwards River-Wakool and Noosa to
Ballina landscapes highlights the importance of a NWC Plan exploring opportunities to work
with existing corridor initiatives in these landscapes. Transparent exploration of the scientific
rationale as well as community support and interest in new corridor areas will prove vital to
ensure that investment made in corridor initiatives is effective in leveraging available capacity
and expertise.
Monitoring, reporting and evaluation
The draft NWC Plan recognises the importance of monitoring, evaluation and reporting.
Additional work is clearly needed to more fully define the objectives and targets for
implementation that would form the basis for reporting on a NWC Plan. The draft plan
indicates that reporting would largely devolve to individual States, Territories and NRM
bodies. Significant investment is already made to satisfy state, catchment and local
government reporting on natural resource condition change indicators and ‘state of the
environment’ reporting.
Further work is needed to explore:
expectations around the nature and frequency of reporting by State’s and NRM bodies in
particular;
the design and use of metrics for predicting and measuring improvements in connectivity
within corridors, relative to other landscapes;
opportunities for appropriate indicators to be developed based on existing information; and
the Australian Government’s likely role in supporting additional data collection, management
and processing to support the proposed annual reporting.
Additional information
Further information on this submission may be obtained from Dr Jacquie Tracey, Acting
Director Landscapes and Ecosystems Conservation by email at
`jacquie.tracey@environment.nsw.gov.au .
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Submission by the Office of Environment and Heritage NSW