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Response to Draft Qld Invasive Plants and Animals Strategy (QIPAS)

The following is the submission by the Invasive Species Council, Queensland Conservation Council and AgForce to the draft Qld Invasive Plants and Animals Strategy (QIPAS).

While many positive elements of the former strategy are worth retaining, developing this new strategy provides an opportunity for new ideas and improvements – as suggested in this submission below and attached.

QIPAS implementation

Strategic action 3.2 Determine priorities and develop Statewide strategic plans for individual invasive plants and animals and specific practices is an example of an action where our organisations’ policy leadership roles can provide meaningful support.

A dedicated QIPAS project team will ensure these statewide plans are implemented during the life of the strategy. A QIPAS project team should involve a dedicated coordinator to ensure the strategy’s success, lead strategic action implementation in consultation with scientists and key stakeholder groups, and report to the Queensland Invasive Plants and Animals Committee. The upcoming election and potential change in leadership provide an opportunity to secure adequate funding for implementation.

Resourcing industry and community responses

We also support strategic actions 1.4 and 1.5 recognising the vital role of industry and community early detection, prevention and control. This engagement needs support from long-term funding sources with clear criteria that address state priorities at a regional, landscape or catchment scale. Resourcing should balance environmental, agriculture and community well-being. Outcome-oriented investments can establish best practice control and monitoring for community and industry uptake. Clarity and continuity for funds like the Feral Pest Initiative will avoid short-term, ad hoc, politically driven, ineffective responses.

A regional approach with dedicated coordination

Many invasive plant and animal responses are best delivered at a regional level. Funding regional invasive plant and animal coordinators with dedicated frontline staffing and project resources will ensure that the QIPAS statewide plans are implemented based on local prioritisation. Statutory powers and resources delivered at a regional level in line with practices in other Australian jurisdictions should be considered. Regional coordination will help close existing land management and risk mitigation gaps across a range of public and private tenures. The QIPAS project team should drive the development of the regional coordinator model. 

Failure to coordinate pest responses creates gaps in management, where invasive species can find refuge and increase their population. This is an all too common issue when an area-wide baiting program is carried out, and complacent landholders create significant problems for others in the community. An area-wide approach like the Regional Biosecurity Groups in Western Australia helps to ensure that pests and weeds are managed on a landscape scale. 

Frontline resourcing

Additional frontline staffing resources are needed. Frontline staff limitations constrain invasive plant and animal early detection, prevention and control. The community and industry can do their part if supported by permanent professional pest management staff. These roles can be delivered through Natural Resource Management groups, Queensland Parks and Wildlife pest management rangers and further support for local government roles. 

Succession is a key part of strategic planning. We understand several key Department of Agriculture and Fisheries (DAF) staff in biosecurity roles and permit applications (special use, minor use, and emergency use) are currently at or nearing retirement. Succession planning is necessary to identify critical skill areas to pre-emptively ensure upskilling and training. In the example of crop protection products, if DAF is not able to swiftly prepare permit applications due to a lack of trained personnel, delays could have disastrous consequences. 

Spread prevention

This strategy devolves risk, responsibility and costs for on-ground management downwards. The invasion curve model emphasises the role of government interventions at earlier management stages. This model should also provide reliable resourcing to those doing ground-level work managing established invasive plants and animals that cause costly damage and environmental destruction in Queensland. These are well beyond eradication, prevention, or containment. This strategy risks side-stepping government responsibility and devolves on-ground action for spread prevention to those with the least power to implement change at the required scale. 

An example is the closure of multiple wash-down facilities because the respective local governments were not resourced to upgrade the infrastructure to meet standards for discharge/runoff. Consequently, regions are more vulnerable to the spread of weeds through unwashed vehicles and machinery. Previously, there was a Queensland weed spread prevention strategy,  with a Queensland-wide working group, a coordinator and committed funding – including grant money to local governments to upgrade or build washdown facilities. There was also a database of washdown facilities. At present, it is difficult for anyone wanting to wash down to know where they can find a functional facility. There is a strong need to review the current status of weed spread prevention in Queensland. 

Biosecurity, stock routes and conservation areas

Councils with significant primary stock routes in their local area must prepare a stock route management plan. The QIPAS strategy does not mention the Stock Route Network Management Strategy. If inadequately managed, these stock routes could act as invasion pathways throughout an extensive landscape, providing havens for pests and weeds. 

Moreover, when landholders apply for freehold conversion of a Grazing Homestead Perpetual Lease (GHPL), the Department of Resources responds with a requirement to widen stock routes. This widening will increase the area under local government management – what additional funding is available to ensure these areas are properly managed? Accompanied by increased camping in stock routes by travellers, this has consequences for biosecurity. Ideally, groups using stock routes would comply with their GBO, but education is required to promote “come clean, go clean” methods and appropriate waste disposal. 

Similar considerations apply to large land acquisitions for new national parks in Queensland. Strategic planning at the state and regional levels is needed to ensure sufficient resources for managing these large areas – to ensure they do not become habitats for invasive species or overgrown with weeds that increase fire risk and intensity. Such outcomes would undermine their conservation potential and increase risk for surrounding landholders and wildlife. 

Woody weeds in Great Barrier Reef catchment areas

In Great Barrier Reef catchment areas legislative and regulatory confusion inadvertently discourages mechanical clearing and herbicide control of woody weeds in riparian zones. The result is an expansion of highly invasive woody weed species that damage environmental values and agricultural land use. The QIPAS should have an objective to communicate and coordinate with inter-jurisdictional agencies in and around the Great Barrier Reef to manage large areas of woody weeds in riparian areas and floodplains.  

Queensland Feral Cat Management Plan

Feral cats directly contributed to the extinction of more than 20 Australian mammals and put direct pressure on at least 124 Australian species endangered with extinction.

In Queensland, local councils can enforce 24/7 cat containment, pet cat microchipping and have access to a range of cat control tools. Because there is no Queensland feral cat management plan local government responses to roaming cats vary widely. Responses in some areas undermine strong efforts on cat management in others.

A Queensland feral cat management plan should be rapidly delivered through the QIPAS framework.

Research, Development and Extension

From 2012, the Campbell Newman government in Queensland made enormous cuts to the public sector. This resulted in the loss of key scientists and technicians in areas such as Charters Towers, Toowoomba and the Boggo Road Ecosciences Precinct. It had a devastating effect on invasive plant and animal research.  The legacy of Campbell Newman’s government has left a lasting impact on staffing in these key areas of RD&E. Restoring this capacity is essential to support and inform strategic planning.

Increasing the burden on the few remaining researchers, the strategy gives researchers the responsibility for “Training and education in best management practice.” It is an unrealistic assumption that this small number of researchers will be capable, supported or resourced to deliver on this expectation. 

Designated DAF extension officers are needed for the organised transfer of R&D to those directly responsible for controlling invasive species. Failure to do so will continue to limit the uptake of valuable tools to control invasive species. For example, the splatter gun (or gas gun) is an excellent tool for applying herbicide to lantana foliage and it has been available for over a decade however there is limited uptake and awareness of this tool. Expecting other groups to manage extension given the ad-hoc nature of funding is an ineffective strategy. 

Additionally, the strategy is unclear on processes used to guide investment in the Invasive Plants and Animals Research Prospectus. Strategic foresight is necessary to ensure funding continuity, as is presently the case with biological control research, which risks losing momentum due to funding uncertainty.

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Save the Snowies

The NSW government is one step away from allowing aerial control of feral horses in Kosciuszko National Park. This is huge news and a crucial step for our threatened native wildlife and the fragile alpine ecosystems they call home.

Dear Project Team,

[YOUR PERSONALISED MESSAGE WILL APPEAR HERE.] 

I support the amendment to the Kosciuszko National Park Wild Horse Heritage Management Plan to allow our incredible National Parks staff to use aerial shooting as one method to rapidly reduce feral horse numbers. I want to see feral horse numbers urgently reduced in order to save the national park and our native wildlife that live there.

The current approach is not solving the problem. Feral horse numbers have rapidly increased in Kosciuszko National Park to around 18,000, a 30% jump in just the past 2 years. With the population so high, thousands of feral horses need to be removed annually to reduce numbers and stop our National Park becoming a horse paddock. Aerial shooting, undertaken humanely and safely by professionals using standard protocols, is the only way this can happen.

The government’s own management plan for feral horses states that ‘if undertaken in accordance with best practice, aerial shooting can have the lowest negative animal welfare impacts of all lethal control methods’.

This humane and effective practice is already used across Australia to manage hundreds of thousands of feral animals like horses, deer, pigs, and goats.

Trapping and rehoming of feral horses has been used in Kosciuszko National Park for well over a decade but has consistently failed to reduce the population, has delayed meaningful action and is expensive. There are too many feral horses in the Alps and not enough demand for rehoming for it to be relied upon for the reduction of the population.

Fertility control as a management tool is only effective for a small, geographically isolated, and accessible population of feral horses where the management outcome sought is to maintain the population at its current size. It is not a viable option to reduce the large and growing feral horse population in the vast and rugged terrain of Kosciuszko National Park.

Feral horses are trashing and trampling our sensitive alpine ecosystems and streams, causing the decline and extinction of native animals. The federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee has stated that feral horses ‘may be the crucial factor that causes final extinction’ for 12 alpine species.

I recognise the sad reality that urgent and humane measures are necessary to urgently remove the horses or they will destroy the Snowies and the native wildlife that call the mountains home. I support a healthy national park where native species like the Corroboree Frog and Mountain Pygmy Possum can thrive.

Kind regards,
[Your name]
[Your email address]
[Your postcode]


Dear Project Team,

[YOUR PERSONALISED MESSAGE WILL APPEAR HERE.] 

I support the amendment to the Kosciuszko National Park Wild Horse Heritage Management Plan to allow our incredible National Parks staff to use aerial shooting as one method to rapidly reduce feral horse numbers. I want to see feral horse numbers urgently reduced in order to save the national park and our native wildlife that live there.

The current approach is not solving the problem. Feral horse numbers have rapidly increased in Kosciuszko National Park to around 18,000, a 30% jump in just the past 2 years. With the population so high, thousands of feral horses need to be removed annually to reduce numbers and stop our National Park becoming a horse paddock. Aerial shooting, undertaken humanely and safely by professionals using standard protocols, is the only way this can happen.

The government’s own management plan for feral horses states that ‘if undertaken in accordance with best practice, aerial shooting can have the lowest negative animal welfare impacts of all lethal control methods’.

This humane and effective practice is already used across Australia to manage hundreds of thousands of feral animals like horses, deer, pigs, and goats.

Trapping and rehoming of feral horses has been used in Kosciuszko National Park for well over a decade but has consistently failed to reduce the population, has delayed meaningful action and is expensive. There are too many feral horses in the Alps and not enough demand for rehoming for it to be relied upon for the reduction of the population.

Fertility control as a management tool is only effective for a small, geographically isolated, and accessible population of feral horses where the management outcome sought is to maintain the population at its current size. It is not a viable option to reduce the large and growing feral horse population in the vast and rugged terrain of Kosciuszko National Park.

Feral horses are trashing and trampling our sensitive alpine ecosystems and streams, causing the decline and extinction of native animals. The federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee has stated that feral horses ‘may be the crucial factor that causes final extinction’ for 12 alpine species.

I recognise the sad reality that urgent and humane measures are necessary to urgently remove the horses or they will destroy the Snowies and the native wildlife that call the mountains home. I support a healthy national park where native species like the Corroboree Frog and Mountain Pygmy Possum can thrive.

Kind regards,
[Your name]
[Your email address]
[Your postcode]