Wildlife, ecosystems under threat as Australia clears land for cattle

Calls for tougher oversight, incentives for landholders to protect forests

- Jonathan Pearlman

Large-scale deforestation in Australia - mainly for cattle farming has prompted calls for tougher oversight and incentives for farmers who protect forests, amid concerns about the dire toll on the environment and on threatened species like koalas.

Despite the country backing a UN commitment to end deforestation by 2030, land clearing is still continuing on a massive scale, especially in eastern Australia.

In the five years to 2023, Australia lost 4.8 million ha of tree cover, according to the Global Forest Watch website. This was the world's seventh-largest loss of tree cover, behind Russia, which lost 28.9 million ha; Canada, which lost 18.9 million ha; Brazil, which lost 18 million ha; and the US, Democratic Republic of Congo and Indonesia.

The north-eastern state of Queensland alone recorded clearing of 323,676ha more than four times the size of Singapore - in the 12 months to June 30, 2022, the most recent year for which data was available.

In New South Wales (NSW), one of the country's other major offenders, 26,735ha of woodland was cleared in 2021, according to data.

Such land clearing is damaging and destroying habitats of native species and harming local ecosystems.

Loss of habitat contributed to a decision by the federal government in 2022 to declare koalas an endangered species, and has led to about 100 million animals each year dying or being seriously harmed in NSW and Queensland, according to a study in July commissioned by Greenpeace.

Professor Martine Maron, an expert on biodiversity and conservation science from the University of Queensland, told The Straits Times that laws in Australia were failing to prevent deforestation.