What’s it about in short: article on biodiversity offsets and policy change (?) in New South Wales, Australia
When was it released: March 6, 2015
By whom: Peter Hannam, The Sydney Morning Herald
Short extract:
Labor is promising to scrap the Coalition’s biodiversity offset program that allows miners to compensate for habitat destruction often far from the mine, a pledge welcomed by conservation groups.
The current Biodiversity Policy for Major Projects introduced last year by the Baird government is allowing an “unjustified loss of habitat and wildlife”, Labor said in a statement.
A revised policy under Labor would limit offsets to “like-for-like” land “within a reasonable geographic proximity” of the area being cleared. Outcomes would avoid so-called net-loss outcomes, and recognise that some lands are of too valuable to be disturbed, Labor said in a statement.