Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2024L00930:reg:2:p46
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2024L00930
Segment Type: reg
Provision Reference: reg 2 (pt 46/48)
Character Range: 191154–194216

be undertaken across multiple years (minimum 3 – 5 years) to reliably capture the presence of breeding females given female southern right whales have an average 3-year breeding cycle and any annual variability in the distribution and abundance of southern right whales in Australian coastal areas. It is important that cross industry and research collaborations be encouraged in broad-scale monitoring aimed at better informing baseline knowledge to reduce duplication in efforts within the same region. In the case of mitigating ongoing impacts, robust monitoring should be undertaken throughout the life of the action to appropriately evaluate outcomes of the predicted levels of impact and inform decisions on adaptive management.

      3.12.4          Adaptive management
The primary goal for adaptive management should be to identify the most practical and effective ways to remove or reduce the risk of adverse impacts on southern right whales. There must be an intentional approach to evaluate the effects of the development activity and effectiveness of the mitigation measures implemented through monitoring to reduce uncertainty around the potential impacts. Adaptive management frameworks should be adopted that can account for any new science, new technology and unanticipated changes in environmental factors to reduce uncertainty in the risk of threats throughout the life of a project or activity.

      3.12.5          Cumulative effects
There are a range of natural and anthropogenic threats that affect southern right whales (section 3), and these stressors are likely to interact. Combined, their cumulative effects can potentially severely affect recovery of the species. For example, the effects of climate change on environmental conditions (e.g., sea surface temperature anomalies) on right whale foraging grounds can affect female reproductive success, resulting in depressed pregnancy rates and subsequently impact recovery on their coastal breeding grounds (Leaper et al. 2006, Meyer-Gutbrod et al. 2015, Seyboth et al. 2016). The risk of threats to southern right whales should not be assessed in isolation, and consideration must be given to existing, and future processes and actions, that may affect recovery of the southern right whale (section 3.10). Assessing cumulative effects from various threats in the context of species recovery fundamentally requires a management focus on reducing the current risk to a species. However, some threats operate over longer time scales (e.g., climate change) and there should be a focus on managing threats that can be reduced in the short term, such as anthropogenic underwater noise, entanglement, and/or vessel strike, while maintaining efforts to reduce impacts from long-term threats such as climate change.

   4     Vision, objectives, and targets

   4.1         Long-term recovery vision
The long-term vision for the recovery of the southern right whales in Australian waters is that the population has increased in size to a level that the conservation status has improved, and