Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2021L01354:body:0:p97
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2021L01354
Segment Type: other
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Character Range: 276511–279671

the Minister on all aspects of the future development of the park.

   IUCN categories and management principles

   The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) sets out guidelines for categorising protected areas, which Australia and many other countries have adopted as a national standard. The EPBC Act requires Commonwealth reserves, and any zones into which a reserve is divided, to be assigned to one of the seven categories prescribed by the EPBC Regulations (r.10.03H), which correspond to the categories identified by the IUCN:

     1. strict nature reserve (category Ia);

     2. wilderness area (category Ib);

     3. national park (category II);

     4. natural monument (category III);

     5. habitat/species management area (category IV);

     6. protected landscape/seascape (category V); or

     7. managed resource protected area (category VI).

   Reserve management must be consistent with the relevant Australian IUCN reserve management principles prescribed for each category by Schedule 8 of the EPBC Regulations as described in the next section.

   General administrative principles

   Part 1 of Schedule 8 of the EPBC Regulations sets out general administrative principles applicable to all Commonwealth reserves. These principles underpin management approaches with regard to:
     1. community participation—management arrangements should, to the extent practicable, provide for broad and meaningful participation by the community, public organisations and private interests in designing and carrying out the functions of a reserve or zone;
     2. effective and adaptive management—management arrangements should be effective and appropriate to the biodiversity objectives and the socio-economic context of the reserve or zone. They should be adaptive in character to ensure a capacity to respond to uncertainty and change;
     3. the precautionary principle—a lack of full scientific certainty should not be used as a reason for postponing measures to prevent degradation of the natural and cultural heritage of a reserve or zone where there is a threat of serious or irreversible damage;

     4. minimising impacts—the integrity of a reserve or zone is best conserved by protecting it from disturbance and threatening processes. Potential adverse impacts on the natural, cultural and social environment and surrounding communities should be minimised as far as practicable;
   5.   ecologically sustainable use—if resource use is consistent with the management principles that apply to a reserve or zone, it should be based on the principle (the principle of ecologically sustainable use) that:

     1. natural resources should only be used within their capacity to sustain natural processes while maintaining the life-support systems of nature and
     2. the benefit of the use to the present generation should not diminish the potential of the reserve or zone to meet the needs and aspirations of future generations.

    1. transparency of decision-making—the framework and processes for decision-making for management of the reserve or zone should be transparent. The reason for making decisions