The federal government has launched a spirited defence before the international community of its efforts to protect the Great Barrier Reef, in its latest bid to avoid the reef being listed as “in danger”.
In 2021 the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) issued a draft recommendation that the Great Barrier Reef should be listed as an “in danger” World Heritage site.
Since then Australia has been locked in a multi-year battle to prevent that listing taking effect, a listing it says could place thousands of jobs at risk, particularly in tourism.
Last year UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee ordered a full review of Australia’s management of the Great Barrier Reef, following the sixth mass bleaching event in nine years.
The body identified four areas of concern: climate pollution, water quality, climate-driven disasters like mass bleaching, and fisheries management.
The government estimates the Great Barrier Reef contributes more than $9 billion a year to the Australian economy and, as the nation’s fifth-biggest employer, supports 77,000 jobs.
“There’s no doubt that the Great Barrier Reef is under extreme pressure from a range of factors like climate change, crown-of-thorns starfish, again, still issues around sediment run-off and reef water quality,” Environment Minister Murray Watt told ABC radio on Friday morning.
“But what we can also say is that the actions that both levels of government, along with the broader community, are taking are making the reef more resilient towards those changes.”
Responding to UNESCO, the government on Friday released a state party report on the steps it has undertaken to protect the reef’s ecosystems, in a bid to maintain the reef’s listing of Outstanding Universal Value.
The report emphasised the significant amendments to federal environment laws, passed with the support of the Greens last year, as a key measure that would help protect the reef. It also highlighted the government’s decision to increase Australia’s emissions reduction targets and reduce land-clearing within 50 metres of a watercourse, wetland or drainage line in the reef catchment area.
The federal government has spent $1.2 billion to help build the reef’s resilience and says its total investment – in partnership with the Queensland government – is more than $5 billion since 2014.
Watt said the reef was one of the best-managed reef systems in the world and that Australia had not just met every commitment it has made to protect the reef but gone further.
The Australian Marine Conservation Society’s Great Barrier Reef campaign manager Dr Lissa Schindler said the government had taken positive steps to improve the reef’s health but had not gone far enough.
“Yes, they are pushing forward with renewable energy projects, but they’re also pushing forward with fossil fuel projects, and fossil fuels, like oil and coal and gas, is what is actually driving climate change,” she said.
“Australia’s climate target is not in line with 1.5 degrees [of warming], which is what is needed for coral reefs to survive.”
When UNESCO first signalled its intention to delist the reef of its Outstanding Universal Value status in 2021, the then-Morrison government acknowledged that climate change was the single greatest threat to its survival but insisted that only global action to reduce emissions would have any meaningful impact.
It noted that Australia’s emissions comprised just 1.3 per cent of the global total and said that “Australia’s efforts to reduce its own emissions would have virtually no impact on the long-term health and resilience of the reef”.
The Albanese government has sought to emphasise Australia’s stronger emissions reductions commitments under Labor. Under the Paris Agreement, Australia has set a target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 62-70 per cent below 2005 levels by 2035 – a measure Watt described as “ambitious and achievable”.
The federal government has also argued the Great Barrier Reef is not alone in experiencing mass bleaching events, which have affected coral reefs worldwide as climate change drives ocean temperatures up.
In a letter to UNESCO World Heritage Centre director Lazare Eloundou Assomo, Watt pointed out the 2023-2024 bleaching event had also affected more than 84 per cent of the world’s coral reefs in more than 80 other countries and territories.
“In submitting this report, I want to strongly reiterate that Australia’s management of the [Great Barrier] Reef is recognised as world-leading and our impactful and adaptive actions remain integral to protecting this World Heritage property’s Outstanding Universal Value into the future,” Watt wrote.
“Australia continues to act on its commitments under the Paris Agreement to tackle climate change and remains willing to lend our substantial expertise to other countries with climate-affected World Heritage sites.”
The World Heritage Committee will consider Australia’s response at a session to be held in July. If it deems Australia’s response is insufficient, it will then consider listing the reef as “World Heritage In Danger”.
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Bianca Hall is The Age’s environment and climate reporter, and has worked in a range of roles including as a senior writer, city editor, and in the federal politics bureau in Canberra.Connect via X, Facebook or email.
