The Environment and Natural Resources Committee has carried out the Inquiry under Terms of Reference referred by the Governor-in-Council by Order dated 30 September 1997 under Section 4F of the Parliamentary Committees Act 1968.6 Given other commitments of the Committee, the Inquiry did not commence until August 1998. The full Terms of Reference are reproduced on page iv. The Inquiry lapsed on 24 August 1999 as a consequence of the dissolution of the Legislative Assembly in order to hold a general election, but the Terms of Reference were reissued by Order in Council of 23 May 2000.
The Environment and Natural Resources Committee is a joint investigatory committee of the Victorian Parliament with statutory power to conduct inquiries into matters concerned with the environment, natural resources and land-use planning.7 The Committee's membership is drawn from both Houses of the Victorian Parliament and includes all political parties represented in this Parliament.
The Committee has examined the outcomes of the Senate Inquiry into the Commercial Utilisation of Australian Native Wildlife and considered their applicability to the Victorian context. It has reviewed an array of existing and potential forms of utilisation of native flora and fauna and examined the legislative and regulatory framework associated with such utilisation. The Committee has consulted widely and inspected a range of relevant businesses and organisations involved in utilisation and associated research in Victoria, interstate and overseas.
A key issue before the Committee was whether the current restrictions on taking native flora and fauna from the wild should be changed to allow for commercial utilisation.
The Committee reports on its identification of potential utilisation and its assessment of the economic and environmental sustainability of that potential, and makes recommendations for change to existing controls. It has reported, as required by the Terms of Reference, "within the framework of ecologically sustainable use".
In line with the Terms of Reference, the Committee has not reported on the utilisation of a number of floral and faunal groups, "due to recently completed or ongoing government inquiries".8 These exclusions are:
a) marine fish;9
b) marine mammals;
c) existing game species;10
d) pest species;11 and
e) native trees harvested for timber.
