Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2023L01713:body:0:p8
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2023L01713
Segment Type: other
Provision Reference: 
Character Range: 19654–22710

the species as a whole.
The review recommended future recovery planning should prioritise actions to:
1)        Minimise negative impacts to water mouse at locations along the central and southern Queensland coasts that are important for long-term species persistence.
2)        Increase knowledge about the water mouse distribution across northern Australia.
The review concluded that effective and efficient use of available resources will be essential for implementing successful water mouse recovery actions over the next ten years.
Finally, the review recognised significant complexities in stopping the decline of the water mouse. Specifically, within the extensive distribution of the water mouse there is a wide range of partners and management capacities and also a broad diversity of land uses and development pressures. As such, a recovery plan is necessary to guide planning processes and adaptive management and monitoring programs to stabilise and better understand the national population of this poorly understood species.

2.2                  Conservation status
The water mouse is listed as Vulnerable in the list of threatened species established under the Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 and the Queensland Nature Conservation (Animals) Regulation 2020 (under the Nature Conservation Act 1992). It is also listed as Vulnerable in The Action Plan for Australian Mammals 2012 (Woinarski et al 2014) and on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (Woinarski and Burbidge 2016). The water mouse is listed as Data Deficient under the Northern Territory Territory Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act 2000. It is yet to be detected in Western Australia or New South Wales and is not listed as threatened in these states.
Eligibility criteria were not included when the water mouse transferred to the EPBC Act threatened species list in July 2000 from the preceding Endangered Species Protection Act 1992. The IUCN listing criterion of B2ab(ii,iii,v) was based on it being plausible that the area of occupancy is less than 2000 km2 and it is a severely fragmented national population, combined with a continuing decline in area of occupancy, extent and quality of habitat, and number of mature individuals (Woinarski and Burbidge 2016).

2.3                  International obligations
Australia is a Signatory to the international Ramsar Convention (1971) to halt the worldwide loss of wetlands and to conserve, through wise use and management, those that remain. The water mouse is recorded from several Wetlands of International Importance that are listed under the Ramsar Convention (Australian Ramsar Wetlands 2021) and thus fall under international obligations for wise use and management to ensure they maintain their ecological character within the context of sustainable development (DAWE 2012):
1)        Moreton Bay in southeast Queensland,
2)        Great Sandy Strait on the southern Queensland coast, and
3)        Kakadu National Park in the Northern Territory.
Other Ramsar Wetlands of