Thursday, 18 May 2023

Koala management

Georgie PURCELL (Northern Victoria) (15:57): (239) My adjournment matter this evening is for the Minister for Environment. The updated Victorian Koala Management Strategy was recently released. It outlines the government’s goals and actions for the conservation and management of Victoria’s koalas for the next 10 years. Significant, increasing issues impact Victoria’s koalas, including the climate emergency, major bushfires and planned burning, road strike and the establishment of commercial blue gum plantations and habitat destruction. The vision for the strategy is to ensure Victoria’s koala populations and habitat are secure, healthy and sustainable in the long term. However, the government will also be undertaking koala management programs at high-density populations in accordance with the strategy and framework.

On 8 May it was revealed that American company Alcoa had killed 152 koalas suffering poor health on land adjacent to its Portland aluminium smelter in Victoria. They were killed under the supervision of so-called independent experts during a series of checks undertaken since 2019. Alcoa’s assessments found the population’s health is poor, and over the last two years 60 per cent of animals checked were euthanised due to overpopulation and exposure to fluoride emissions. This was authorised by the conservation regulator.

Alcoa has acknowledged the potential impacts from its operations of fluorosis on wildlife around the site – it is a disease that causes malnutrition as well as skeletal and dental abnormalities – and now plans to encourage a further 120 koalas living in forest near the smelter to relocate through the removal of a 17-hectare plantation which currently supports them. While koalas in the ACT, New South Wales and Queensland are listed as endangered, the Victorian government maintains that Victorian koalas are secure. The government estimates that 50,000 koalas live in plantations, the majority of which are in south-west Victoria. Wildlife groups across Victoria advocate for koalas in blue gum plantations and rescue countless koalas from road strike each and every year.

The recently formed Koala Alliance Victoria is concerned the species is not abundant and that it faces pressure from habitat loss, leading to disease and starvation. Advocates have also reported that planned burns are scheduled or have occurred in known koala habitat with no koala spotters present. Victorians, koala advocates and an increasing international audience as well as me would like to know whether the minister will commit to meeting with Koala Alliance Victoria to hear their concerns regarding the Victorian Koala Management Strategy and koala protection throughout Victoria.