It's been a while since the last update on FATE activities and there have been some significant developments in that time as FATE has become firmly established at the University of New South Wales and several on-ground demonstration projects have begun to take shape. The FATE team has grown with the employment of a new project officer and the move to UNSW has also produced some other valuable collaborations on geographic information systems, arid zone research, kangaroo research, environmental market-based instruments and rangeland monitoring. A strategic plan has been drafted to guide FATE through the next 5 years at UNSW and a number of key projects have come to the fore. In particular, progress has been made on developing a model for greenleasing of rural landholders, establishing a native plant production demonstration site west of Sydney, investigating consumer choice behaviour in relation to kangaroo meat and collaborative projects on kangaroo harvesting in the western division of NSW.
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In July 2005, the FATE program successfully recruited a new project officer, Alex Baumber, to support FATE program manager Peter Ampt. Alex has experience in regulating the harvesting of native animals and plants with the Australian Government and also holds a honours degree in Environmental Science.
Alex Baumber and Peter Ampt outside FATE headquarters, UNSW
A draft FATE Strategic Plan has been developed to guide the program through until 2008. We welcome the comments of all friends of FATE on this important framework document (and its very readable at only two pages). Download the draft FATE Strategic Plan and email us your views to p.ampt@unsw.edu.au
The FATE team has been working hard on a number of funding applications through the Natural Heritage Trust, National Landcare Program and Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation to investigate the different ways in which valuing native species might help to improve the ecological and economic resilience of Australia's threatened ecosystems.
Recent applications have focused on kangaroo harvesting and consumption. Despite being Australia's largest terrestrial wildlife harvesting program with over 30 years of careful management to ensure sustainability, commercial kangaroo harvesting yet to see substantial returns flowing to landholders and a substantial change from perceptions of kangaroos as a pest to a resource. FATE has been working with two different landholder groups in the Willandra Lakes and Barrier Ranges regions of western NSW to explore collaborative kangaroo management across a number of properties. Such collaborative arrangements, which draw upon traditional notions of managing lands as a "commons" could potentially provide the critical mass for landholders to derive returns from kangaroos harvested on their properties, whilst at the same time improving management of total grazing pressure. Although such collaborative approaches seem only natural for a free-ranging animal with no respect for Western notions of property boundaries it is not always easy to change established land management approaches overnight.
The other aspect of kangaroo utilisation that FATE has been exploring is the perceptions of kangaroo meat amongst consumers and the marketing strategies that could be employed to target those consumer groups most likely to be receptive to kangaroo products. Despite being the red meat of choice in Australia for over 40 000 years, this extremely low-fat meat has historically struggled to gain mainstream acceptance in a marketplace dominated by inhereted European ideas of what should and shouldn't be eaten (have you ever wondered why Australians will readily accept so many different species that we pluck from the oceans - mostly native- but will only eat a handful of land-dwelling animals - all introduced?).
FATE has continued working on the concept of Greenleasing, whereby portions of rural properties could be leased from landholders to be managed for conservation and sustainable production of commercially-valuable native species. Despite an unsuccessful funding bid to the Natural Heritage Trust (NHT), FATE has been working with interested landholders and investors to see this innovative concept implemented for the benefit of landholders, the public at large (including future generations) and of course, for Australia's threatened ecosystems themselves.
FATE has also been working on a demonstration site west of Sydney in conjunction with the Blue Mountains World Heritage Institute and Hawkesbury-Nepean Catchment Management Authority that could serve to demonstrate the potential of native plant harvesting as a viable alternative landuse to coventional agriculture. Such a site would not take the form of the traditional European-style farm but would instead be based on a mixed-species plantation approach with a bias towards commercially-valuable native species that will improve landscape function and provide habitat for non-commercial native plants and animals. The involvement of indigenous groups from an early stage will hopefully help to include traditional knowledge of natural plant associations and uses and provide increased opportunities for local indigenous people to be involved in land management, education and tourism.
Potential demonstration site in the lower Blue Mountains west
of Sydney. Images courtesty of Roger Attwater, Blue Mountains World Heritage
Institute.
The FATE team has been involved in a number of public events in the past few months including attending the NSW Landcare and Catchment Management Forum in Wagga in August 2005, an Australian Science Communicators discussion panel involving Prof Mike Archer on commerical kangaroo harvesting, radio interviews and a participation in a number of workshops on the development of Environmental Management Systems (EMSs) for the management of farming and grazing land.
FATE's collaboration with Australia
21 has also developed further. Mike Archer is Program Leader of their
productive and resilient Ecosystems (PARE) Program and he and Peter Ampt have
been involved in several Australia 21 Roundtables. Peter is an Australia 21
Scholar and has been active in the converting the findings of the PARE Roundtables
into FATE projects. The Adelaide roundtable contributed to work on projects
on multiple objective land-use, marketing of products from native species
and initial steps towards a national approach to developing industries based
on native species. A key development from the Adelaide Roundtable was an emphasis
on environmental management and accreditation systems which became the focus
of the Brisbane and Canberra Roundtables. In addition, the FATE Greenleasing
concept has been strongly endorsed by Australia 21, with Chairman Bob Douglas
giving it a big plug in his keynote address to the NSW Landcare Forum in Wagga
in August.
Last Updated 17 October 2005
