Grazing in NSW National Parks ??

[forest]

It appears that our fabled environmental minister Robin Parker might be at it again.

I have been forwarded an email from a shooters party member directly from Robert Brown outlining that they only wish to support this so as to oppose the greens. Gees that's good policy.
R Browns quote:
I hope that you don't object to me circulating some of these petitions.
Some of the issues may seem peripheral to hunting/shooting issues, however
I believe our ability to influence these is important for the overall protection
of our activities... particularly through NOT allowing the Greens to have all the say.
Regards,
Robert


http://www.weeklytimesnow.com.au/articl ... -news.html

Pole here
http://www.weeklytimesnow.com.au/opinion/index.html

[Hallu]

Well tell me if I'm wrong but Australia looks pretty much backwards in terms of National Parks : despite their name, they're not regulated by the nation, but by the states (there's no nation-wide policy), they're too numerous (more than 500 is ridiculous), and the "regulations" are usually absent (phone towers, HV power lines, motor-sports, mining in some parks and now grazing...). The landscapes and wildlife are amazing, which means it's even harder to understand why NP policy seems to be 100 years old... Nevertheless, I know some national parks where grazing and hunting is authorized : there are many in Europe, because people lived there for centuries, hence their presence is part of the ecosystem now, and their hunting and grazing is unfortunately part of the equilibrium, so there was pretty much no choice. But declaring a NP and then later allowing grazing to come back is suicidal. It's like sending a clear message : "we don't care about what people do to our national parks, this title has absolutely no value in terms of conservation"...

[Strider]

they're too numerous (more than 500 is ridiculous)

Are you suggesting we should have LESS National Parks???

[Hallu]

Well yeah... I'm not suggesting they should become unprotected areas of course, just that they become state parks or regional reserves or something. There are countless areas that don't deserve that status of National Park, and the fact that we have so many of them is harmful to the notion of National Park itself. There should be a careful review about what's required to be a NP, just as there is in the US for example. In America, they worship their National Parks, they know most of them, they want to see them all. Who knows all the NP of Australia ? So many of them are just little pockets of forest and wildlife, because it's almost impossible to declare a huge area a national park thanks to miners, farmers and foresters. And when it's done despite all that, there are still problems, like uranium mining in Kakadu. And that's what's in line for Cape York it seems, this area should already be one giant NP. Not to mention the Kimberley and the countless industrial projects of giants harbors in order to feed China's hunger for minerals that prevent the region to be entirely protected once and for all.

I mean something like Churchill NP in Victoria should never be a NP... It's incredibly small, there's a huge power line cutting it in half, a National Park should be more than that. Same thing with Organ Pipes NP. And next to that, you have huge regions like the Tarkine in TAS where there's not a single NP because of the forest industry. A national park should be something like Alpine, Kosciuszko, Southwest, or Franklin-Gordon.

[Strider]

you have huge regions like the Tarkine in TAS where there's not a single NP because of the forest industry.

Perhaps that will change now the forestry industry has all but collapsed...

[tom_brennan]

they're too numerous (more than 500 is ridiculous)

Are you suggesting we should have LESS National Parks???

I think we should have less National Parks. Governments like to create new parks as it gives them something they can proclaim. But in many cases they should just add the area to an existing park.

[Mark F]

One of the reasons conservation groups want land declared national park is that national park status provides a more secure barrier to exploitation than other land tenure forms. While NP status is obviously not sacrosanct given recent actions and proposals by several state governments it is the best we have unless WHA status is added. WH status provides the Commonwealth with involvement in land management decisions affecting the area. The reason for all this is that the Australian Constitution only handed defined powers to the Commonwealth with the states retaining all others including land management. Most attempts by the Commonwealth to have a say in land management is fiercely resisted by state governments unless it is accompanied by large buckets of money. Just look at the Murray-Darling debates.

[Hallu]

Yeah those issues were here a century ago in the US (states vs the nation), and were mostly helped by the Antiquities Act, the fact that the president could set aside a piece of land at will. The loophole was that originally it was meant for the president to select mostly historical buildings, artifacts or civil war battlefield areas for conservation, but it never specified a limit in size, so the presidents used it as a pre-National Park status, the Grand Canyon was a national monument before it became a national park, because the state of Arizona was full of industrial lobbyists who wanted to fill the Grand Canyon with dams and refused to make it a NP... This Antiquities Act turned out to be a beautiful thing, it even helped Jimmy Carter save Alaska's wilderness, making huge parcels tens of thousand of square kms big into protected National Monuments. It's too bad there isn't such a thing in Australia, or Cape York and the Kimberley would all have been set aside for conservation decades ago. The fact that you need state approval has always been a disaster for conservation. There's a great book, The National Parks: America's Best Idea by Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan that describe the history of NPs in America, and when I hear about Australian NPs, it feels like a copy/paste of the American situation 100 years ago. The problem is Australia doesn't have a Theodore Roosevelt, a Rockefeller, or a Stephen Mather. Three main things helped American create their NPs : the will of their presidents, via the powerful Antiquities Act, the will of the people, willing to sing the praise of natural landscapes or group their resources together to buy pieces of land to set aside for public enjoyment, and the passion of a few rich men, who were willing to buy huge parcels of land and give them to the government so they can make it a NP. Regarding rich men, I only see Chinese businessmen stealing Australia's land in order to make a profit, I still haven't seen one buying it in order to protect it...