Verification of the Heritage Value of ENGO-Proposed Reserves
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IVG REPORT 5A Verification of the heritage value of ENGO-proposed reserves Verification of the Heritage Value of ENGO-Proposed Reserves IVG Forest Conservation REPORT 5A 1 March 2012 IVG REPORT 5A Verification of the heritage value of ENGO-proposed reserves IVG Forest Conservation Report 5A Verification of the Heritage Value of ENGO-Proposed Reserves An assessment and verification of the ‘National and World Heritage Values and significance of Tasmania’s native forest estate with particular reference to the area of Tasmanian forest identified by ENGOs as being of High Conservation Value’ Written by Peter Hitchcock, for the Independent Verification Group for the Tasmanian Forests Intergovernmental Agreement 2011. Published February 2012 Photo credits for chapter headings: All photographs by Rob Blakers With the exception of Chapter 2 (crayfish): Todd Walsh All photos copyright the photographers 2 IVG REPORT 5A Verification of the heritage value of ENGO-proposed reserves About the author—Peter Hitchcock AM The author’s career of more than 40 years has focused on natural resource management and conservation, specialising in protected areas and World Heritage. Briefly, the author: trained and graduated—in forest science progressing to operational forest mapping, timber resource assessment, management planning and supervision of field operations applied conservation—progressed into natural heritage conservation including conservation planning and protected area design corporate management—held a range of positions, including as, Deputy Director (Policy and Wildlife), NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service, and the inaugural Executive Director of the Wet Tropics (World Heritage) Management Authority (WTMA) in Queensland, Australia. The author’s professional experience in heritage conservation, including World Heritage, is extensive and ongoing, including: Australia o Commissioner on Australian Heritage Commission (two terms) NSW o Conservation planning, protection and management of forests in parks and reserves o Team member in World Heritage nomination of the Central Eastern Rainforests of NSW and Qld. (now Gondwana Rainforests) Queensland: Wet Tropics World Heritage Area o First Executive Director of Wet Tropics Management Authority (1991–96) Tasmania o Commissioner on Commission of Inquiry into Southern Forests of Tasmania o Consultancy on boundary review of TWWHA Lebanon o Consultant advisor to UN Cedars of Lebanon project South East Asian Forests o World Heritage assessment, monitoring, management planning of forests in Indonesia, including Papua. o Management review of selected National Parks in Indonesia o Forest Conservation Advisor, BTRF, Indonesia South America o Guyana, World Heritage assessment of forest area Papua New Guinea o Australian Government Adviser, World Heritage and Protected Areas The author currently operates his Cairns based consultancy, Old Cassowary Consulting (OCConsulting), specialising in natural heritage conservation and World Heritage issues. His World Heritage experience in and/or visits include Argentina, Austria, Canada, Croatia, Guyana, Indonesia, Japan, Kiribati, Lebanon, Madagascar, Malaysia, Nepal, New Zealand Papua New Guinea, Syria, Thailand, Turkey, USA and Venezuela. 3 IVG REPORT 5A Verification of the heritage value of ENGO-proposed reserves Contents Executive summary Background Chapter 1: Tall eucalypt forests as World Heritage Chapter 2: Contributing values to formal assessment of World Heritage and/or National Heritage significance PART 1—Primarily World Heritage values Chapter 3: Southern Forests Chapter 4: West Coast Chapter 5: Tarkine Chapter 6: North Central PART 2—Primarily National Heritage values Chapter 7: North Coastal Chapter 8: North East Chapter 9: South East MAPS Map 1: Proposed revised boundary of the TWWHA and proposed boundaries for areas identified as National Heritage value Map 2: Distribution of tall eucalypt forest and giant trees and ENGO-proposed reserves Map 3: Logging history and related disturbance APPENDIXES Appendix 1: Spatially Identifying Tall Eucalypt Forests in Tasmania. 4 IVG REPORT 5A Verification of the heritage value of ENGO-proposed reserves Executive summary Introduction It proved a challenging task to assess and verify the: National and World Heritage values and significance of Tasmania’s native forest estate with particular reference to the area of Tasmanian forest identified by ENGOs as being of High Conservation Value and referred to in the Tasmanian Forests Intergovernmental Agreement of 7 August, 2011, noting that the ENGO identified HCV areas comprise 572,000 hectares. Adding to the challenge was the fact that these lands were made up of some 270 different parcels from all parts of Tasmania. Assessment methodology Given strict time constraints on the heritage verification process, most assessments were limited to landscape level assessment, drawing on any accessible and reliable data source. Information referred to included ENGO documents posted on the Environment Tasmania website at www.et.org.au Particular use was made of published scientific papers and grey literature. A substantial amount of data was extracted from various government online databases, in particular the Land Information Service Tasmania (LIST). Considerable use was made of Google Earth imagery which fortuitously now has a layer showing Tasmanian formal reserve boundaries (not including Forestry Tasmania Forest Reserves). A substantial amount of Forestry Tasmania geospatial data was accessed. Some assessments relied on personal communications with experts and are attributed accordingly. The author is very familiar with aspects of the Tasmanian landscape and was able to draw upon this knowledge in interpreting available data, maps and imagery. Assessment of individual parcels of land was mostly not comprehensive, and only conducted to the level sufficient to make a definitive finding on whether an area was of likely national or global significance. If a parcel of land was found to be important habitat of a species of national significance, then the assessment was often not extended beyond that identified value. In a number of cases, once an area was assessed as being of World Heritage significance, it was not assessed further for national significance on the assumption that the national significance would shadow global significance. For some parcels of land, accessible data failed to elucidate any documented values. However, this was not proof positive that the land was not of conservation value. Indeed, in some cases the land appeared likely to be of conservation value but there was no documentation to confirm this. Where there was doubt, a precautionary approach was adopted and the finding left open and recommending further investigation. In some cases when it was clear that a parcel was most unlikely to have conservation value at a state level of significance or above, the finding was one of ‘conservation value not verified’. A significant number of very small parcels were assessed as having no conservation value. These may make locally important contributions to boundary issues. The author’s plea is that while the assessment process was conducted with every reasonable effort to accurately identify any conservation values, it is possible some conservation values have been overlooked. A precautionary approach is therefore urged throughout the follow-up process. Context for assessment 5 IVG REPORT 5A Verification of the heritage value of ENGO-proposed reserves When assessing land for conservation value and hence heritage conservation significance it is important to understand the land’s context. This is especially so for smaller areas of land and was the case for many of the ENGO reserve proposals, some of which were very small. The geographic and/or ecological context can be critically important to establishing the conservation value(s) of a parcel of land. Some factors important in assessing conservation value include proximity to existing protected areas, other comparable habitat, and connectivity to other lands of known conservation value (see below). Assessing the relative value or significance also required a contextual knowledge and understanding of the attributes of a piece of land, such as whether the same attributes are locally, regionally or nationally rare, common or are replicated elsewhere. Assessment at ‘cluster’ or landscape level Given the many and varied parcels of land in the ENGO-proposed reserves, it was in some cases, more logical to assess at a holistic or landscape level. Compared with separately assessed individual parcels, landscape level assessments are based on shared attributes and/or recognisable geographic groupings or ‘clusters’ of land parcels. It was found that individual parcels in some clusters shared certain attributes and that much of their relative value came from their context within that cluster. Most notable was the Tarkine area. It was a logical cluster that had already been assessed by others, including the National Heritage Council, as a ‘cluster’ or a single entity. It was evident that there were one or two regional-scale ‘clusters’ in the North East and down the East Coast of the state. This was not surprising given many of the ENGO-proposed reserves within these clusters shared the theme of ‘linking landscapes’. This reinforced the need to conduct the initial level of assessment of conservation value at the regional or ‘cluster’ level, given the role that connectivity might play between individual parcels and existing