AMCS and Queensland Government respond to Reef “In Danger” list recommendation

The Reactive Monitoring Mission report released today by World Heritage Committee’s scientific advisory bodies shows the Great Barrier Reef is in trouble and outlines the critical steps needed to protect it. Australia has a small window of time to focus on solutions and meaningful climate action. The Reactive Monitoring Mission report gives the Australian and Queensland governments a clear road map on how to avoid the Reef being placed on the ‘In Danger’ list.

Following the release of the report, the Australian Marine Conservation Society notes that the Australian and Queensland governments must act quickly and decisively on protecting the Great Barrier Reef while the Queensland Government claim that they are working with the Australian Government and acting on climate change.

AMCS Great Barrier Reef Campaign Manager Dr Lissa Schindler advises “The Great Barrier Reef is Australia’s most spectacular natural wonder and an international treasure that’s threatened by global warming, agricultural pollution and commercial fishing.

“The Australian and Queensland governments have made important steps towards helping the Reef lately but the Reactive Monitoring Mission report highlighted that more action is urgently needed if they are serious about saving the Reef and the $6 billion tourism industry and 60,000 jobs it supports.

“Governments must combat climate change by drastically cutting emissions to limit global warming to 1.5oC – a critical threshold for corals. Every fraction of a degree matters. They also need to urgently tackle local threats to the Reef by stopping water pollution from agricultural run-off, controlling tree clearing and erosion, ending gillnet fishing and monitoring trawling catches in Reef waters.”

Australia’s climate and energy minister, Chris Bowen, stressed the need to keep global warming to 1.5oC at the recent COP27 meeting “It’s important because if we’re not trying to keep to 1.5C, then what are we here for?” he said to the Guardian news outlet.

The World Heritage Committee (WHC) sent its scientific advisers, UNESCO and the IUCN, to take a first-hand look at the Great Barrier Reef after it put the previous Coalition Government's management of the Reef on notice at the WHC meeting in 2021.

The Reactive Monitoring Mission visited the Reef in March during the latest mass bleaching event – the fourth since 2016. The mission’s report will inform the WHC’s decision as to whether to list the Reef as “In Danger” when it next meets. The WHC’s decision will also be informed by whether the Australian and Queensland governments work to deliver the actions recommended in the report to protect the Reef.

Dr Schindler adds “Global warming is the Reef’s greatest threat, driving the marine heatwaves that lead to the damaging mass bleaching events that have struck the Reef in recent years. Business as usual will not safeguard the Reef, we need climate policies and a plan to tackle the climate crisis damaging our Reef.

“Australia has an outsized impact on climate, responsible for 5% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.1 Queensland alone contributes a third of Australia’s emissions and is ranked third highest in the world per capita. As a start, the federal government should reject the Clive Palmer-owned Central Queensland Coal mine and Queensland should increase its woefully inadequate emissions reduction target.

“The Reef is also threatened by polluted run-off from agricultural land, including sediment that can smother the Reef and synthetic fertilisers that turbo-charge algal blooms. The Queensland Government must enforce the regulations to prevent run-off from agricultural land and work with the federal government to restore large areas of coastal wetlands – nature's water quality filters.

“The Queensland Government must control tree clearing in Reef catchments because of the failure of the 2018 legislation to slow clearing.2 It must close loopholes that allow clearing without permits. The Australian Government must enforce federal laws and improve them to stop clearing of threatened species habitat.

“Unsustainable and illegal fishing is one of the biggest local threats to the Reef. High-risk fishing methods such as gillnet fishing and trawling continue to cause the deaths of threatened species such as dugongs, turtles and sawfish on our Reef. The Queensland Government must end gillnet fishing in Reef waters to give our iconic dugongs and turtles a chance to recover. The Queensland Government must also immediately roll out cameras on all trawl vessels to independently monitor the bycatch in this high-risk fishery.”

In response to the report, Queensland Minister for the Environment and the Great Barrier Reef and Minister for Science and Youth Affairs, Meaghan Scanlon notes “Since this report was written, things have changed. We finally have a Government in Canberra working with Queensland and acting on climate change.

“The report calls for the Federal and State Governments to undertake ‘ambitious, rapid and sustained’ action to protect the reef.

“That’s what we are doing.

“Since the mission, we have taken ambitious action on climate with a $62 billion Energy and Jobs Plan that will generate cleaner, cheaper energy right at the reef’s doorstep, and transition our coal fired power stations to clean energy hubs.

“In last year’s budget we committed $270 million to continue the Queensland Reef Water Quality Program, and address water pollution, taking our total spend since 2015 to over $1 billion.

“We’re scaling up land restoration, supporting farmers to improve runoff, banning more single-use plastics and driving sustainability with a $1.1 billion Recycling and Jobs Fund.

“It builds on strong, tree clearing laws we introduced in 2018, as well as reef regulations we introduced to address land-based sources of water pollution into the reef, both measures opposed by the Queensland LNP opposition.

“We will continue to build on these actions, while supporting the unparalleled science and management frameworks underpinning our conservation efforts, as recognised by the report.”

The Reactive Monitoring Report can be found at whc.unesco.org/en/documents/197090