Australia "a renegade" on environment, says report
Date: 20-Aug-02
Country: AUSTRALIA
Author: Michael Christie
The report, commissioned by a plethora of green groups, contradicted recent assertions by the conservative government of Prime Minister John Howard that it had made great strides in controlling pollution and promoting sustainable land use.
The official data on which the government based its claim showed the opposite, said the report, titled "In Reverse" and released yesterday.
"Over the past decade, Australia has been a continent in reverse," said the document, issued to coincide with next week's World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa.
"It is going backwards on nearly every indicator of our environmental health, including the loss of plants and animals, land clearing and degradation, the condition of Australia's inland waters, and greenhouse gas emissions.
"Per capita, Australians generate more greenhouse gases and clear more land than the people of any other wealthy nation. Internationally, Australia is a laggard state," it said.
The document, which was based on official statistics, blasted the government for turning a country once regarded as an enthusiastic participant in international environmental accords into a "recognised spoiler" and "renegade state".
Siding with the United States and arguing it made no sense without the inclusion of developing nations such as China, Canberra has abandoned the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on reducing greenhouse gas emissions blamed for warming temperatures.
It nevertheless said last week that it was on track to meet its Kyoto target of an eight percent increase in carbon dioxide emissions from 1990 levels by 2012, and that without government intervention, emissions would have shot up by 22 percent.
"EXCELLENT RECORD"
Environment Minister David Kemp hit back at the new report, saying it ignored Australia's "excellent" record on biodiversity, global warming and whale protection.
"I totally reject the notion that Australia is not being entirely responsible in an environmental sense and through its environmental policies, both internationally and domestically," he said yesterday.
The report, backed by the Australian Conservation Foundation, Australian Council for Overseas Aid and more than a dozen others, said the government's claims to excellence were overstated.
The statistics actually showed that Australia's carbon dioxide emissions had increased by 17.4 percent since 1990 and would rise by a total of 30 percent by 2012.
The report painted a picture of what it called a looming "ecological crisis" in Australia.
- Between 1993 and 2001, the number of extinct, endangered or vulnerable bird and animal species rose to 160 from 118.
- Australia is now fifth behind Brazil, Indonesia, the Congo and Bolivia in terms of the amount of land cleared annually.
- With five percent of the world's land mass, Australia accounts for 19 percent of the earth's soil erosion.
- The world's driest continent, Australia nevertheless has one of the highest levels of per capita water consumption. Between 1993/94 and 1996/97 water use increased by 16 percent.
- A top coal exporter, Australia is a major league polluter. It is the largest per capita emitter of greenhouse gases and one of the biggest per capita consumers of energy.
"These worsening problems highlight the fact that the Australian economy, structurally and functionally, is ecologically unsustainable," the report said.
