Warning bell for Barrier Reef

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Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Broadcast: 02/10/2012

Reporter: Emma Albelrici

Environment minister Tony Burke says the Australian Institute of Marine Science report on the Barrier Reef, which predicts that as little as 6 per cent of the coral could remain by 2020, would send shockwaves through the community and sound a loud and clear warning bell about the future of the reef.


EMMA ALBERICI, PRESENTER: And to discuss the threat to the Barrier Reef I was joined just a short time ago from our Parliament House studio by Federal Environment Minister Tony Burke. Tony Burke, thanks for joining us.


EMMA ALBERICI: So Minister, essentially what we're to take from today's report is every Australian should be rushing to take their child to the reef before it's gone?

TONY BURKE: I reckon today's report would have sent shockwaves through a whole lot of households. We've all heard about damage to the reef over the years, but that 50 per cent figure, I think, rang a warning bell loud and clear for many people.

Now, there's programs that we started about five years ago that I dearly wish had been started 25 years ago, and a number of things this report calls on us to do we are in fact now doing. But there's no doubt that there's been a level of neglect for decades, which if it had been dealt with otherwise we'd be in a much better situation now.

EMMA ALBERICI: Can you guarantee that you can restore now the coral cover that's been lost, or at the very least stop what's there from dying off?

TONY BURKE: Well, for a lot of it ... I mean, 90 per cent of these impacts are some way or another related to runoff. They talk about the inundation from the major weather events, and the report also talks about the crown-of-thorns outbreaks, which are related to the runoff and the nutrients ... overload of nutrients in the area.

Now, they're the exact issues that we've been focussing on for the last five years. So, I've got a high level of confidence that what this report is calling on us to do in a big way reflects what we've been doing for the last five years, but it's also a big warning bell that ... a warning message to us that under no circumstances can we take the foot off the accelerator on that sort of work.

EMMA ALBERICI: Well, let's progress to sort of nut down into some of that detail. In the past 50 years there have been four deadly outbreaks of the crown-of-thorn starfish; they're deadly obviously to the coral. What's the plan to kill off those starfish?

TONY BURKE: There's two parts of it. The first and the immediate part is killing the starfish that are there now. Now, in years gone by people would occasionally go through individually collecting them. The most effective thing that we've come up with these days is we send divers down, and they inject the starfish one at a time - and, you know, in 10 days, not that long ago, they got through 1,300 of them.

So those individual injections, those projects have an impact when the outbreak has occurred. But the causes of the outbreak ... because crown-of-thorns is native, you're meant to have some of them. The problem is you get a massive increase in the numbers when you get too much in the way of nutrients and runoff coming down from the reef. And when that occurs you get numbers surviving the juvenile phase way beyond what would happen naturally, and that's when you get the sorts of challenges that you've spoken about.

EMMA ALBERICI: Well, exactly, and that's what we're talking about with these deadly outbreaks that have been going on, and frankly I spoke to some scientists today who study the reef who say it's a bit of a nonsense to talk about killing them off one at a time - even 1,300 of them is a fraction of, for instance, one female who produces 60 million eggs.

TONY BURKE: And that's why you've got to do both, that's why you absolutely have to do both. So we've got the divers who do that work - and that's done jointly with the tourism industry - but that's a bit over $1 million into that.

The main work - and that's where $200 million has gone into - is working to avoid the impacts of runoff on land. And I've been arguing and had arguments with the Queensland Government on these sorts of issues about the importance of what you do on land having an impact on the reef.

Now, five years ago we kicked off a thing called Reef Rescue, and that's where the $200 million has gone. And it's been projects with cattle graziers and in particular with cane growers where we've been upgrading their equipment, upgrading their technology and having a massive difference to the impact of how much chemical is going into the ground and how much runoff as a result is then going into the reef.

EMMA ALBERICI: How much of a massive difference?

TONY BURKE: Well, when I was agriculture I remember visiting one of the cane fields not far from Mackay. Now out there there are about four or five cane growers, from memory, who got together under this program. We contributed the funding, and what they'd done with the new equipment was they had GPSed basically every square metre of their properties, and with the soil testing knew exactly how much chemical and fertiliser is required, and adjusted it at each different point as the tractor would go across the property.

Now, I remember those people telling me that they had reduced their chemical and fertiliser use to one seventh of what it used to be. Now that isn't just one seventh reduction in runoff, it's better than that, because basically it means what they put in is no more than what the cane itself requires.

And when you can have those sorts of impacts - and that work has now been going for five years - if we're able to keep doing that sort of work then you do get to turn a corner on what has been a steady pathway of degradation for decade after decade.

EMMA ALBERICI: But the degradation has been most evident, and in fact accelerated, over the last five to seven years. So what you're saying about the advancements in agriculture don't seem to be reflected in this report?

TONY BURKE: In five years I'm not going to pretend that $200 million has turned the corner on every single property. But it is making a very, very significant difference.

EMMA ALBERICI: It's not showing up in the report though, is it, that it's making a significant difference?

TONY BURKE: I think in the context when you take that time period, you've had some of the most significant major weather events that we've ever had along the Queensland coast during that period. So when you have those major weather events to that extent, and the damage that comes from an increase intensity of major cyclones, that of itself, work on farm isn't going to completely neutralise; you're going to get some sediment runoff even if it involves fewer chemicals than it otherwise would have.

There are some issues where the action takes time. Action on climate change, having an impact on acidification of the oceans; those particular issues do take some time, and they are among the issues that are causing continued significant damage.

But on the ones that we can act on quickly - whether it be the direct poisoning of the crown-of-thorns when the outbreaks occur, or whether it be having a significant impact on changing farm practices in a way that ... there's been full cooperation from the Cattle Graziers Organisation with AgForce and crane growers themselves, that sort of cooperation can't be discounted, and yet it's in the context for the time period you said.

We've had a very large number of very intense cyclones. But what's going into the ground now is much, much less than what used to.

EMMA ALBERICI: How much less?

TONY BURKE: Well, I told you about the property that was one seventh, for example.

EMMA ALBERICI: I know, but back in 2009 when your Government launched that Reef Rescue program that you spoke about with that $200 million commitment, the objective was to cut pollutants in the water by 50 per cent by 2013, is that target being met?

TONY BURKE: The next reef report won't be too far out, and so we'll have the next reef report where we've got ...

EMMA ALBERICI: You should know if it's going to be met or not; surely it's not a secret?

TONY BURKE: Well, we're tracking the meeting of it. The context of the water purity though obviously takes a big step back when you get major cyclones of that nature. I don't think anyone would expect that a government program like Reef Rescue was going to have an immediate impact on the intensity of cyclones.

What it was able to have an immediate impact on was the potential impacts of runoff by reducing the levels of chemical and fertiliser use. On that, the impact's been huge. On the context of these particular years having the cyclonic conditions that we've had, no government program would be able to fix that.

EMMA ALBERICI: But your stated goal was to have no chemical fertiliser spilling into the reef at all by 2020. You haven't produced a report card since 2009/2010, why not?

TONY BURKE: The next one ... the next one won't be far off. I don't have a date for you for the next report.

EMMA ALBERICI: Why not since 2010/2011?

TONY BURKE: The last one ... I'm trying to remember the last discussions on the last one. I'm not able to give you an answer right now on the timing of the last one. These issues are negotiated between us and the Queensland Government on the timing of the report card.

Importantly, the report card is something where you've got a good level of independent oversight, and something that prior to us did not exist at all. And we've now got the benefit of the research that's been announced by AIMS, it's come out today. The additional information of that feeds into the next report card.

EMMA ALBERICI: If you can manage to pass new laws to stop a super trawler entering Australian waters, then what sort of crisis intervention will you no instigate to arrest this decline in the reef? Doesn't it make sense for the Federal Government to take over this supervision, given this kind of confused double role between the state and the Feds?

TONY BURKE: The distinction between what we did and the Queensland Government did, I think, actually the distinction between those two worked perfectly. The Queensland Government brought in specific regulations that put maximum limits on how much chemical and fertiliser use was able to be used. So they put some upper limits and had a regulatory approach.

We put the money on the table that enabled the farmers to be able to far more effectively meet those targets. So those two proposals hardly conflicted. They were completely complimentary. Now I wrote some weeks ago to the Queensland Government asking them for advice on how they want to work together with us on the next phase of Reef Rescue.

They haven't responded yet but I'm not critical of them for that. They've had the letter for a limited amount of time, and I've got no reason to believe that they won't find a way, particularly in the light of this report. I've got a pretty high degree of confidence that they will be willing to cooperate on this.

EMMA ALBERICI: Environmental groups are now calling on you to commit $500 million at least over the next seven years to continue with this Reef Rescue program. Are you committed to putting more money into it?

TONY BURKE: Reef Rescue will continue, there's no doubt that we'll find a way for Reef Rescue to continue. Exactly how many dollars are on the table is something we're working through, I'm not able to make the announcement on that yet. I know the UNESCO report, when they came out through the World Heritage Committee, they called on us to at least maintain the funding that we had.

But as I say, the decision on the exact amount of money - it was $200 million last time - the exact amount of money for the next phase is something that we haven't announced yet, it won't be too far off.

EMMA ALBERICI: The UNESCO report you talk of came out in June and it criticised the management of the Great Barrier Reef and it warned that the area could actually be downgraded to World Heritage Site in Danger unless Australia made major changes to its supervision. How seriously is your Government taking that threat?

TONY BURKE: I think ... I would summarise their report a bit differently to how you have. For example, that report in particular was very complimentary of the Reef Rescue program that we've been talking about, very complimentary of that work.

Similarly, the threat to the reef that that report referred to didn't deal with what had happened so far, but very strongly was concerned about the risk to the reef if the number of projects that were currently in the pipeline all went ahead. Now, that's why they carried, as one of their recommendations, that until they get to a final strategic assessment, they didn't want us to be dealing with new port developments other than in established port areas, and that's been reflected by the pathway we've been going ahead with.

EMMA ALBERICI: Because it did express "extreme concern", were the words that they used, at the rapid rate of coastal development at sites like Gladstone and Curtis Island for liquefied natural gas plants, and it says "no new developments that affect the reef should go ahead until a thorough assessment of the area is carried out". Is that what's happening now?

TONY BURKE: Yes ... I think in the quote ... I'm not sure exactly that quote that you've pulled from, but there's a quote very similar to that that does add the words "outside the existing port areas" - established port areas - in it. And that is something that has certainly been reflected in the pathway that we've been following.

Abbot Point is an existing port, Gladstone is a significant existing port as well. Hay Point is a similar one. There's a number of projects that have been in the pipeline that the Queensland Government certainly haven't been urging for a quick approval on or a quick consideration on that are in areas that you would classify as relatively pristine.

Some of them would not involve dredging but some of them would, and I think the United Nations understandably was sounding some alarm bells about them.

EMMA ALBERICI: It would be quite a blow to the $5 billion tourism industry associated with the reef, wouldn't it, and not to mention the 65,000 jobs that depend on the reef, if UNESCO did downgrade the reef to "in danger". This has become as much an economic issue as an environmental one, hasn't it?

TONY BURKE: It's both. The reef is both. There's no doubt about that. I have a high degree of confidence and I met with that World Heritage mission in three separate conversations. I have a high degree of confidence that they won't end up going down the "in danger" path, that the management quality that GBRMPA puts in place, the Marine Park Authority, and the way we're handling developments is something that will give them a high degree of confidence.

But as you say, I mean ... just as the economics of it are real, it's also true that even if the economics weren't there, we have in the Great Barrier Reef one of the stand out assets for the planet. And yes, there's massive economic consequences associated with it, but before you even get to that there is a responsibility that we have in managing it well, and this report is a wake up call to anybody who thought we could just let things go as they were.

EMMA ALBERICI: Minister, we appreciate so much of your time this evening, thanks very much.

TONY BURKE: Good to be with you.


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