In regards to the benefits of auction, it allows those who wish to take a public resource as private property - to pay for the privilege. Please note, a bushwalker has no rights to take or pick (animal, vegetable, or mineral) from public land such as a National Park without licence, and the walker does not threaten the amenity of others. What the Shooters propose is quite different from bushwalking.
An auction for licence system has merit when applied to the concept of hunting feral species and taking trophies from public lands, including those lands outside National Parks. The most obvious precedent for a pay-for-prey system is the CAMPFIRE model developed in Africa, which is discussed at length in Rosaleen Duffy's book 'Killing for Conservation'. This scheme is favourably reviewed in the Shooters manifesto 'Conservation Through Hunting', and widely credited with social and environmental benefit through the provision of funds. The manifesto references a paper discussing CAMPFIRE by Frost & Bond, 2006:
http://pubs.iied.org/pdfs/15503IIED.pdfThe Game Council and the 'Shooters and Fishers' are, in the public debate, strangely silent on the conservation benefits which would flow from a system requiring payment for 'game'. Not so in the manifesto, where we learn:
...experience from overseas shows that, where Conservation Hunting is properly-regulated, Conservation Hunters are a crucially-important element for the conservation of many species with surprisingly - large economic benefits. (Vol. 1, Ch 3, pg 146)
In a submission to the Australian Veterinary Association (AVA), it is claimed:
Hunters also provide financial support for conservation agencies through payment of fees for permits and licences. (Vol 2, Ch 6, pg 42)
And on the 'future of the utilisation of wildlife in Australia and NSW', we are told:
The least one should expect is that Government agencies collaborate and that Conservation hunters, who WANT to shoot exotic vertebrate animals and will even PAY for it, are not excluded and vilified but supported and made more effective. (Vol 2, Ch 6, pg 45)
In the context of feral species, a financial contribution from hunters would be appreciated by conservationists. However, to realise the value of 'game' species it is suggested that we must accept a paradigm shift, and to shun the term 'pest' which is:
so widely, indiscriminately, subjectively, and arbitarily used in Australia, [and] has distorted our views and prevented us from applying rational approaches to wildlife management. We believe that the impact of exotic species that have been declared environmental pests...is neither clear nor convincing. (Vol 2, Ch 6, pg 38)
We should embrace change, and:
...support the [Conservation Hunters] use of renewable (if exotic) resource...In this new world-view "pests" will cease to exist but become "wildlife" which can be harvested for income and / or population control. There will be no "native" or "exotic" fauna, but simply different animal species and communities which will need to be managed... (Vol 2, Ch 6, pg 39)
And move on from the:
sacrosanct, sanctimonious, and highly proprietary status of endangered wildlife by Government agencies and scientists... (Vol 2, Ch 6, pg 25)
By so doing we can forget taboos, and utilise the services of Conservation Hunters to control the Koala on Kangaroo Island, and the Kangaroo more generally (Vol 2, Ch 6, pg 32). We will also overcome reluctance and conserve threatened species by providing habitat and breeding them as game, including
Australia's pigeons...[which] could probably greatly benefit from becoming cherished game again! (Vol 2, Ch 6, pg 47-48)
Despite all of these novel ideas, the debate regarding hunting on public lands as presented by the Game Council to the community has not emphasised the promise of more substantial financial and environmental benefit flowing to conservation and community, as they do within the manifesto. Though the Game Council has a dream, to reinvent conservation in the public imagination (a grander project than any dam), Conservation Hunting is simply presented to the common man as doing something vaguely positive about that apparently illusory, feral animal problem (to use that old-world lingo).
On the subject of elitism and inequality - why do you find this a concern? Elitism limits numbers, reduces the risk to other users of public lands, facilitates supervision, and hinders the establishment of a dangerous gun culture. In short, it prevents a free-for-all developing. The suggestion that hunting opportunities (wherever they are to occur) should be limited to competent hunters, of good character, of sufficient intelligence, with self-control, and keen eyesight - would surely be a reasonable expectation. But by imposing such conditions, or by endorsing professional hunters, we discriminate and applaud the elite do we not?
Cheers
