Earthling Environmental Activist Forum 

Biodiversity crisis panel  

12:30pm - 2:30pm Sunday 1^st October, 2006, Newcastle Town Hall, Banquet Room 

Australia leads the world in species extinction and we face a biodiversity crisis. What have we done wrong? New responses are being developed across the country, from Gondwana Link in WA to Biobanking in NSW. Panellists and audience discuss whether new directions in conservation can halt the looming crisis.  

In July this year, London’s Zoological Society warned that the world is on the brink of a major biodiversity crisis. Australia harbours internationally recognised biodiversity hotspots, and we also lead the world in the rate of species extinction. In 2003, Emeritus Professor Harry Recher, write an editorial for Pacific Conservation Biology that baldly stated that “something different needs to be done to have at least a chance of saving more than a small sample of Australia’s biodiversity.”  

What exactly have we done wrong? And what is being done now to address the looming extinction crisis?  There is increasing recognition across the country that the isolated public reserves that have been created in the hope of preserving our diminishing biodiversity either not gone far enough or have taken us down the wrong path altogether.  

New responses to the biodiversity crisis are being developed across the country: From Gondwana Link in WA to Biobanking in NSW. Our panellists discuss some new directions in biodiversity conservation, and ask the question: Are environmental activists out of touch with the real needs of biodiversity conservation?  

James Watson, National Wildcountry coodinator for the Wilderness Society

Peter Robertson, Coordinator, Environment Centre Northern Territory

Ashley Love, NSW North Coast conservationist

Carmel Flint, North East Forest Alliance  

The panellists will lead us into the issues, and present their perspective, followed by a whole-of-room discussion around the questions raised.