Biobanking. The NSW Department of Environment and Conservation’s (DEC) Environment Protection and Regulatory Division (EPRD) is currently engaged in a process to implement a biodiversity offset scheme – termed “Biodiversity Banking” — that seeks to address the impacts of “our expanding urban footprint on biodiversity values” by creating “new opportunities for private sector conservation management of land”. The scheme forms part of the Government’s recent Threatened Species Amendment package and is set to be trialled in the Lower Hunter. These amendments, introduced late 2004, opened the way for a carrot and stick approach to threatened species protection in NSW.
Biobanking bill introduced
******* IMPORTANT NEWS *******
The biodiversity Banking Bill has been introduced into NSW parliament, with the promise that we will have the Winter recess to read and respond to its content. Already there are some worrying developments, such as the intimiation, in the 2nd reading speech, that through this Bill “Conservation effort is shifted from small pockets of expensive land which is more suited to development onto lower priced land, where the pressure of weeds, pests species and degradation is lower” — If land value forms any part of the biobanking equation, it will not deliver on its promises.
1st October, 2005: Whinging developers jeopardise Region’s future
Whinging developers jeopardise Region’s future
The regional development clique has been labelled “spoiled” and “predatory” by local environmentalists this week following a strategic leak of selected details of the pending Lower Hunter Regional Strategy to the Newcastle Herald.
Regional Conservation
HCEC is engaged in advocating for biodiversity protection in our region. The Lower Hunter is at a turning point: We are faced with a looming extinction debt but have not yet begun to take seriously our responsibility to protect biodiversity. The Lower Hunter faces significant pressure from industry and from residential development. Equally, the Lower Hunter region is a highly threatened, ecologically important and exceptionally diverse area. A total of 19 endangered ecological communities and 80 threatened fauna species have been recorded in the region. The existing reserve system in the region is biased and inadequate. Fifty-percent of all vegetation communities and 80% of all priority fauna populations in the region have not met their basic conservation targets.