Green Queensland - Land conservation
2020 target: Protect 50% more land for nature conservation and public recreation
Measure: national park estate (source: Environmental Protection Agency Estate Register); land for public recreation (source: Register to be developed).
Lead agency: Department of Infrastructure and Planning.
Queensland's protected areas today
As at June 2008, 7.6 million hectares of land was dedicated to conservation through 282 national parks.
In just the past few months, a further 200,000 hectares of national park estate has been protected, including a nationally significant rainforest wilderness area in the McIlwraith Range in Cape York.
Queensland is also home to 80% of Australia's native birds, 70% of its native mammals and just over half of its native reptiles and frogs.
This inheritance of wildlife carries with it a responsibility to protect and preserve it.
Land for recreation
While we have a comprehensive Queensland-wide picture of protected areas, information on urban green space such as parks, playing fields, walking and horse riding trails is held by different levels of government.
We will create a register of green space across the state that provides a comprehensive snapshot of the state's recreational land bank.
We do know that South East Queensland has only about 19% of public open space compared with 49% for the Greater Sydney region.
We also know recreational land in Brisbane is unevenly distributed with 68% located north of the Brisbane River and 57% of the population living south of the River.
Achievements since September 2007
- Committed to establish a major parkland at Springfield in the growing western corridor of South-East Queensland, which will be 20% bigger than Brisbane's Roma Street Parkland.
- Declared the new KULLA (McIlwraith Range) 160,000 hectare national park in Cape York - the largest undisturbed tropical rainforest area in Australia.
Challenges
Development: the biggest challenge is the rapid pace of urban development in our cities and towns. As Queensland grows we must hold onto land for natural habitat and green spaces; our unique lifestyle depends on it.
Achieving the target
We need to take action today to keep Queensland green and preserve space to breathe in our communities.
The Queensland Government will play its part by:
- protecting more areas as national park and other protected areas to secure our unique biodiversity
- protecting green space as part of regional planning processes throughout the state
- providing recreational facilities to enable Queenslanders to experience our great outdoors
- developing a full state-wide inventory of all land held for public recreation.
We need local government to support our efforts, by prioritising the establishment of parks, nature reserves and other public recreation spaces as land is developed.
Share your ideas
What can you do to support the target to increase land for conservation and public recreation? Share your ideas
Last updated Monday, February 09, 2009
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