THREATENED species will benefit from a new national strategy released by Federal Environment Minister Sussan Ley today, if backed by further resources and a strong package of legislative reform, according to the Humane Society International (HSI).

Welcoming the 10-year strategy, conservation organisation HSI qualified its response by warning the Threatened Species Strategy would only succeed if it was accompanied by “robust laws to support its goals”.

“The strategy is a good road map to improve the recovery trajectory for threatened species and the places they live in,” HIS head of campaigns, Nicola Beynon said. 

“HSI welcomes the broadening of the strategy to focus beyond a small number of species to include their habitats and importantly also the drivers of their decline.

“While the strategy itself is a definite improvement, addressing Australia’s growing extinction crisis is going to require a substantial increase in investment in species recovery and a stronger set of laws to get the job done.

“We are very pleased to see the addition of a broader range of taxonomic groups to the new strategy, including marine species, and agree with the criteria that will be used to prioritise species.”

HSI is responsible for nominating 74 threatened fauna species listed in Australia with more nominations pending assessment.

HSI is also heavily involved in the reform of Australia’s national laws which protect threatened species and ecological communities. 

“It is concerning that amendments to our national environment legislation before parliament will undermine this strategy if states and territories are given too much leeway to approve impacts on threatened species,” Ms Beynon said.

“These bills must be rejected in favour of stronger laws and standards that would bolster and support the government’s ambition and goals in the Threatened Species Strategy.”

www.hsi.org

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THE Joint Standing Committee on Treaties yesterday tabled Report 194, which considers amendments to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

The amendments considered in the report include ten Australian native species and four non-native species Australia trades in.

"The committee supports the amendments," committee chair Dave Sharma MP said. "But the time frame in which amendments come into force means there is usually insufficient or no time for the committee to undertake an inquiry."

Report 194 recommends the Federal Government change its process for referring CITES amendments to the committee to ensure the committee can complete an inquiry before the amendments come into force. 

Report 194 also includes the committee’s views on an agreement to amend the one between Australia and Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway on 'mutual recognition' in relation to Conformity Assessment, Certificates and Markings.

Mutual recognition agreements of this type allow importers to rely on assessments of products made by appropriate bodies in the country of origin for import purposes. The agreement will align the mutual recognition arrangements with Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway with Australia’s existing agreement with the EU.

The committee has recommended the ratification of the agreement amending the Mutual Recognition Agreement with Iceland, Liechtenstein, and Norway.

CITES protects endangered species by regulating international trade in those species and the products derived from them. Amendments to the list of protected species covered by CITES are regularly proposed and adopted.

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A NEW national conservation mission to protect native Australian wildlife from the threat of predation by cats, to be known as Project Noah, is the centrepiece of a new report released by the House of Representatives Environment and Energy Committee today.

Tabling the report, committee chair Ted O’Brien MP said cats had decimated populations of Australian wildlife, killing billions of native animals each year.

“Feral cats kill over three billion native animals a year which equates to a kill rate of more than 1100 per cat," Mr O’Brien said. “These are truly horrific numbers," he said.  

“One of the great tragedies of last year’s Black Summer Bushfires was the loss of wildlife, with between one and three billion animals perishing. To think that feral cats kill more wildlife on an annual basis really put this problem in perspective.  

“Feral cats still need to be culled, but it’s going to take time before we have the technology to rid these lethal carnivores from our natural environment at scale.

“This is why we need a new national conservation mission called Project Noah, aimed at expanding Australia’s network of predator-free fenced areas and islands,” Mr O’Brien said.

“Project Noah would bring together the expertise and resources of governments,  communities, the private sector and philanthropic groups to protect threatened native species from the predation of feral cats and other predators.

“Project Noah should be ambitious in its rollout and it should be implemented across a range of ecosystems.”  

Other recommendations in the Committee’s report included:

• A body of work be conducted to: understand cat impacts; develop nationally consistent definitions for feral, stray and domestic cats; and further research matters such as the prevalence, impact and control of cats, emerging methodologies including gene drive technology; management of cat-borne diseases, and the relationship between cat predation and habitat degradation;
• · A ‘reset’ of the Australian Government’s policy, planning and resourcing in relation to Australia’s feral cat problem to include a new iteration of the Threat Abatement Plan for feral cats; a revised Threatened Species Strategy including new targets for culling feral cats; and consideration of reform opportunities identified through the review of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act;
• · New strategies for the management and control of domestic cats, including such measures as increased support for desexing, registration and microchipping, a consideration of night curfews, and a national cat ownership education campaign.  

A copy of the committee’s full report can be found on the inquiry website at: www.aph.gov.au/feralanddomesticcats

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AS WIND POWER generation becomes more important, experts at Flinders University are examining whether wind ‘farm’ turbine noise in the environment can affect sleep and wellbeing of nearby residents.  

In a review of existing literature on wind turbine noise affects on sleep the Flinders sleep researchers have weighed up the results of five prior studies.

While previous studies showed no systemic affects on common sleep markers – such as time taken to fall asleep and total sleep time – they did reveal some more subtle affects on sleep such as shifts in sleep stages and less time in deep sleep.

“Comparing wind turbine noise to quiet background noise conditions showed no systematic effects on the most widely used objective markers of sleep, including time taken to fall asleep, total sleep time, time spent awake during the night and time spent asleep relative to overall time in bed,” lead author Tessa Liebich said of a new review paper published in the international Journal of Sleep Research. 

“However, some more subtle affects on sleep in some objective studies were established including shifts in sleep stages, less time spent in deep sleep and more time spent in light sleep.” 

Through Australian NHMRC funding, the Adelaide Institute for Sleep Health study at Flinders is studying sleep patterns in more than 70 volunteers in a carefully controlled in-laboratory experimental study to investigate potential wind turbine noise impacts on sleep and daytime outcomes.

Their final results are expected to be available around mid-2021.

Senior author Gorica Micic said limited knowledge and data in this area emphasises a need for further well-controlled experimental studies to provide more conclusive evidence regarding wind turbine noise affects on sleep. 

“Environmental noises, such as traffic noise, are well known to impact sleep,” Dr Micic said. “Given wind power generation is connected with low frequency noise that can travel long distances and more readily into buildings, it is important to better understand the potential impacts of wind turbine noise on sleep.” 

This study aimed to comprehensively review published evidence regarding the impact of wind turbine noise on the most widely accepted objective and subjective measures of sleep time and quality. 

Subjective sleep outcomes were not sufficiently uniform for combining data or comparisons between studies, researchers explained. 

“Nevertheless, the available self-report data appeared to support that insomnia severity, sleep quality and daytime sleepiness can be impacted by wind turbine noise exposure in comparison to quiet background noise,” researchers wrote in the report.  

“However, firm conclusions were difficult to draw from the available studies given inconsistent study methods, variable outcome measures and limited sample sizes.”

www.flinders.edu.au

About the Flinders University Wind Farm Noise Study:  

Flinders University NHMRC five-year collaborative study is looking into how the noise from wind turbines affects people's health. It also tests how much windfarm noise disturbs sleep compared to traffic noise. 

The new research paper, A systematic review and meta-analysis of wind turbine noise effects on sleep using validated objective and subjective sleep assessments (2020) by T Liebich, L Lack, K Hansen K, B Zajamšek, N Lovato, P Catcheside and G Micic (Flinders University) has been published in the Journal of Sleep Research. DOI: 10.1111/jsr.13228 

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