HAVE YOUR SAY ON THE FUTURE OF YOUR SEAS
The Australian public are custodians of Australia’s territorial waters, these extend from 5.5km to 200 kilometres off-shore from all the lands we claim. These waters are the commons that we all own and have a responsibility to look after. The Commonwealth Government is now deciding what parts of your waters it will protect to establish the promised Comprehensive Adequate and Representative (CAR) marine reserve system.
The reserve system is required to include a full range of ecosystems, reasonably reflect the biotic diversity within those ecosystems, and have the required level of reservation to ensure the ecological viability and integrity of populations, species and communities. The evidence is that this will require 20-50% of each population and ecosystem to be fully protected from fishing.
The Commonwealth had divided your waters into six marine regions, and is now deciding the future of five of these regions (it has already decided the fate of waters off Victoria and Tasmania). The waters off NSW are mostly in the Temperate East Marine Region, which extends from Bermagui on the south coast to past Fraser Island, and out to beyond Norfolk Island.
The Commonwealth is proposing that 25% of this region be incorporated into marine reserves, though most reserves are still available for most forms of fishing, with only 4% fully protected in Marine National Park zones.
The proposed outcomes are far worse for coastal ecosystems, with a mere 1.6% of the continental shelf proposed for reservation, with only 0.01% fully protected. Similarly for the continental slope only 8% is proposed for reservation with none fully protected. This is one of the worst outcomes in Australia. We have been duded.
Numerous ecosystems, key ecological features, biologically important areas and severely depleted species have been excluded.
YOU HAVE UNTIL 21 FEBRUARY 2012 TO BE A RESPONSIBLE OWNER AND HAVE YOUR SAY
Conservation groups have reviewed all the Commonwealth’s proposals for this region and recommended a variety of additions, and local conservationist Dailan Pugh has prepared a specific proposal for a Tweed-Byron Marine Reserve. Both reports are available on the marine section of the North Coast Environment Council website http://ncec.wordpress.com/marine/
Please emai your wishes to: Submissions.TemperateEast@environment.gov.au.
Key asks for NSW’s north-coast waters are:
- Establishing the proposed Tweed-Byron Commonwealth Marine Reserve;
- Establishing a link between the proposed Clarence Commonwealth Marine Reserve and the existing Solitary Islands Marine Park, and upgrading the habitat protection zone in the Commonwealth’s existing Solitary Islands Marine Park to a National Parks zone to better protect the habitat of the Grey Nurse Shark, and
- Expanding the boundary of the proposed Hunter Commonwealth Marine Reserve southwards to Nelson Bay;
You may also wish to ask
- That extensive Marine National Park zones be established in all marine reserves, with a minimum of 20-50% of the regional extent of each ecosystem included in Marine National Park zones
- That mining and oil and gas exploration and production be excluded from marine reserves.
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The North Coast Environment Council supports the proposed Tweed Byron Marine Reserve. You can read the full proposal and see the submission guide at the links below.
Please show your support for marine conservation and the proposed Tweed-Byron Commonwealth Marine Reserve by emailing: Submissions.TemperateEast@environment.gov.au
Proposed_Tweed_Byron_Marine_Reserve
Final Submission Guide to Temperate East Marine Region Draft Plan feb 2012
