Otways fauna protection
Sarah MANSFIELD (Western Victoria) (09:39): As we head into summer many Melburnians and people from across Victoria will flock down to the Great Ocean Road to spend time with family and enjoy our pristine beaches and the magnificent Otways, a part of Victoria I am proud to represent. The Otways is a rugged landscape that provides shelter and habitat for species that are struggling elsewhere. It is home to threatened species such as the southern brown bandicoot, long-nosed potoroo, swamp antechinus and rufous bristlebird. This area was spared from the devastation of the Black Saturday bushfires but continues to face a range of threats from wildfire, inappropriate planned burning and invasive species, including cats, pigs, deer and foxes, not to mention climate change.
Pre COVID the Great Ocean Road contributed $1.5 billion to the Victorian economy through tourism, yet only $6 million was contributed by government to the Wild Otways program in 2020, which funded essential research and on-the-ground work to improve the protection and management of threatened species in the Otways. This year this meagre funding will come to an end, and the essential projects it supports will be left in limbo. If we truly value places like the Otways, we must fund the protection of ecosystems and the work of programs like Wild Otways, otherwise we will lose them forever.