Australia should set up a $5-billion ($3.3 bln) fund dedicated to buying up land of high biodiversity value to ensure it meets its commitments under the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), a green group-led initiative said Monday.

The fund topped the list of four broad recommendations set out in a report released Monday by The Nature Conservancy, WWF-Australia, the Australian Land Conservation Alliance, and the Pew Charitable Trusts for Australia to meet its 30×30 target under the GBF, which would mean finding another 60 million hectares of land to protect by the end of the decade.

“The recommendations outlined in this report are built around a robust science-based framework that, if adhered to, will deliver a comprehensive, adequate, and representative network of protected areas on land which will protect the full range of Australia’s landscapes,” the report said.

“With this will come economic, social, and cultural benefits whilst also playing a critical role in preventing new extinctions.”

Their overall recommendations to the government were:

• Establish a A$5-bln fund for land purchase
• Continue to support the creation of new Indigenous Protected Areas (IPAs)
• Boost support for the uptake of permanent conservation through covenants
• Work with states and territories to expand government land under protection

Australia’s proposed nature repair market or Other Effective area-based Conservation Measures (OECM) framework were not on the groups’ list.

“Australia faces an unprecedented opportunity – to build a network of well managed protected areas by 2030, which play a central role in preventing extinctions, mitigating climate change, and delivering continent-wide recovery of environmental values and diversifying regional economies,” the report said.

“To achieve this, we must ensure that our targets encompass a broad selection of representative habitats, in all regions across the continent.”

BUY THE LAND

Australia is currently protecting 22% of its land-based areas, and a part of that came through the government’s National Reserve System Programme, which spent A$200 million over 1996-2013 to buy 371 properties covering 10 mln ha and put them under protection.

However, when the conservative Coalition government took office in 2014, funding for the programme stopped.

The government should now establish a new, dedicated A$5-bln fund to pick up where the NRSP left off, according to the report.

This would allow the government to act quickly when properties become available, make it able to buy strategically important land from willing sellers, provide confidence and certainty for state agencies, NGOs, and others, and pave the way for funds to be leveraged with additional contributions from state and territories, corporates, and others.

At the same time, it would be important for the government to continue its investments in the Indigenous Protected Areas (IPA) programme, which by last year offered protections of almost 11% of Australia’s total land area.

MORE PRIVATE LAND

The groups also called on the government to provide direct support to state and territory conservation covenant programmes “with an explicit focus on expanding the protected area estate in under-represented bioregions and ecosystems”.

More than 6,000 privately owned properties across the country currently protect over 10 mln ha, but the report said there are still a large number of barriers at all levels of government, making such arrangements difficult.

Conservation covenant programmes that offer funding support for protected privately owned land vary in quality across regions, and must be addressed, the groups said.

“Targeted support for covenanting has been shown to deliver outcomes for threatened species or ecological communities, and emerging covenant innovations are endeavouring to promote greater relevance and opportunities for First Nations ownership, access, and management of Country,” the report said.

A review of the current system by Treasury or the Productivity Commission could help remove some of those barriers, according to the groups.

MORE PUBLIC LAND TOO

Lastly, the group said more Crown land could be repurposed for conservation, and that this has been seen to happen in the past.

“There are various types of Crown land in Australia that could be considered for conversion into protected areas, providing a cost-effective opportunity without the cost of acquisition to obtain protection outcomes, particularly in critical areas for biodiversity and areas that provide significant ecosystem services (e.g. carbon and water),” it said.

As an example, it mentioned state forest in Victoria and Western Australia that could become available for repurposing next year, as state governments have vowed to phase out native logging on public land by then.

“Crown land within underrepresented bioregions or that contain under-represented ecosystems and threatened species habitat should also be assessed for potential inclusion in the protected area,” the report said.

Australia is one of the 17 countries globally defined as “megadiverse” but is facing species extinction faster than almost anywhere else on the planet.

The government is in the process of reforming its Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act, though its planned biodiversity credit market has been pushed to next year by the parliamentary committee scrutinising it.

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