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HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES STANDING COMMITTEE ON THE ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY Inquiry into controlling the spread of Cane Toads SUBMISSION FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF THE ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY February 2019 Contents a) EXECUTIVE SUMMARY .................................................................................................................. 3 b) National coordination................................................................................................................... 4 Cane Toads: Impacts on Matters of National Environmental Significance ..................................... 5 c) Roles of the Department of the Environment and Energy ........................................................... 6 Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 .................................................. 6 Funding ......................................................................................................................................... 10 National Park Management.......................................................................................................... 10 Information ................................................................................................................................... 11 d) Inquiry Terms of Reference ........................................................................................................ 11 The effectiveness of control measures to limit the spread of cane toads in Australia. ............... 11 Additional support for cane toad population control measures. ................................................. 13 e) Table 1: Species and sub-species threatened by the cane toads ............................................... 17 f) Table 2: Ecological Community threatened by the cane toads .................................................. 17 g) Table 3: Species to which cane toads are a perceived threat .................................................... 17 h) Figure 1: The indicative distribution of the cane toad (Rhinella marina) .................................. 18 2 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Department of the Environment and Energy welcomes the opportunity to provide a submission to the House of Representatives Standing Committee on the Environment and Energy Inquiry into controlling the spread of cane toads (Rhinella marina, formerly Bufo marinus). Many vertebrate animals introduced to Australia since colonisation have become pests. The Australian Pest Animal Strategy identifies pest animals as a significant social, economic, and environmental burden for Australia, negatively impacting on Australia’s agriculture, biodiversity, natural and built environment, public health and productivity. Within Australia, the combined efforts of local, state, territory and Commonwealth governments, together with the actions of landholders, communities, traditional owners, the private sector and non-government organisations, deliver biodiversity protection and conservation. This includes working together to control invasive plants and animals, including cane toads. The Department works closely with other Australian Government departments, particularly the Department of Agriculture and Water Resources, on biosecurity activities that include abating the threats posed by feral animals. The Commonwealth also works with state and territory governments to develop strategies, undertake research and fund key management activities. The Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (the Act) provides for the identification and listing of key threatening processes. The impacts of some feral animals, including cane toads, have been listed as key threatening processes and threat abatement plans have been developed. The Threat abatement plan for the biological effects, including lethal toxic ingestion, caused by cane toads was made in 2011. The National Landcare Program is a key part of the Australian Government’s commitment to natural resource management. Around $1 billion is being invested in Phase Two, building on the $1 billion invested from July 2014 to June 2018. Introduced feral animals and weeds are part of work in the program’s partnership with state and local governments, industry, communities and individuals. The Australian Government directed at least $11 million dollars to development of a broad-scale means to control cane toads between 1986 and 2011 and approximately $1.3 million to community action to remove cane toads from the landscape manually between 1986 and 2009. National Environmental Science Program funding of $145 million from 2015 to 2021 supports six themed research hubs along with projects to address emerging environmental research needs. The Threatened Species Recovery Hub project Protecting threatened quolls and other biodiversity on Kimberley islands from cane toads is analysing the mechanisms and risk factors associated with cane toad invasion of Kimberley islands. 3 National coordination The Government has international obligations to protect and conserve biodiversity under various conventions and treaties, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity. The Government provides for the protection of environmental matters related to threatened species and ecological communities through the operation of the Act and delivers non-statutory measures such as programs that invest in recovery, restoration, monitoring, and science for the protection and conservation of biodiversity. In 2018, the Australian Government appointed a Chief Environmental Biosecurity Officer to enhance understanding and oversight of environmental biosecurity risks, perform a national policy, engagement and leadership role, ensure that Australia’s environmental and community biosecurity risks are better defined and prioritised, and improve the maturity of Australia’s environmental biosecurity preparedness, surveillance and response capacity. As biodiversity conservation and protection is a shared responsibility, the Australian Government works in collaboration with the states and territories, as well as the range of other government and non-government land and sea managers, to provide protection for, and conservation of, threatened species and ecological communities, and importantly the ecosystems on which they depend. States and territories are responsible for regulating invasive species, including cane toads. Regulations provide varying levels of requirement for control depending on their level of threat and ability of landholders to undertake effective control measures. All responsible landholders, managers and lessees contribute to biodiversity conservation through their management of lands and waters across Australia. Other groups and sectors that invest considerable time, effort and money to invasive species management for biodiversity protection include Indigenous groups, community groups, environmental non-government organisations, businesses including the agricultural sector, and researchers. In combination, these groups have considerable Indigenous, ecological, local knowledge, and technical expertise and play a critical role in on-ground implementation and raising community awareness. Most successes are the product of effective partnerships between governments and non-government groups. The Australian Government provides national coordination through overarching strategies and through species specific or site-specific plans. These strategies and plans allow state, territory and local government, local groups, non-government organisations and landholders to understand how their contribution fits into a broader picture and to provide best practice guidance on how to undertake appropriate management actions. Australian Pest Animal Strategy The Australian Pest Animal Strategy (2017-2027) is a strategy of the national Environment and Invasives Committee, which is part of the framework established under the Intergovernmental Agreement on Biosecurity. The strategy provides national guidance on best practice vertebrate pest 4 animal management. It re-affirms agreed national pest animal management principles, and sets national goals and priorities that will help improve Australia’s overall ability to prevent and respond to new pest animal incursions and manage the negative impacts of established pest animals. This provides the broad policy foundation to guide and inform the actions of stakeholders, including landholders, industry, communities and government, rather than prescribing detailed on-ground actions and activities. Cane toads are captured under this strategy. Cane Toads: Impacts on Matters of National Environmental Significance Threatened Species Cane toads have a known impact on seven threatened species, one threatened sub-species, (Table 1) and one ecological community (Table 2). They are a perceived threat to a further seven species or sub-species, because either the cane toad has not reached their habitat or the impact is unknown1 (Table 3). The State of the Environment 2016 (Cresswell and Murphy 2017) report notes that that: Poisoning by the invasive cane toad (Rhinella marina) is a major threat to 4 species of threatened mammal. The cane toad has had a significant impact on populations of the northern quoll (Dasyurus hallucatus) in northern Australia (Woinarski et al. 2014). Scientists have also recorded marked declines during the past 5 years in many iconic, and culturally and ecologically significant reptile species across northern Australia because of poisoning by cane toads (Shine & Wiens 2010, Fukada et al. 2016). For
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