Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2017L00031:body:0:p3
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2017L00031
Segment Type: other
Provision Reference: 
Character Range: 5698–8916

and adopted by, potential users.

Mitigating the threat and impact of invasive species is a matter of developing, applying and integrating a number of control methods, not relying on one method. It also requires understanding and addressing social and economic factors; for example, through supporting the efforts of private landholders,  leaseholders and volunteers to manage invasive species on their lands to achieve the desired outcomes for biodiversity conservation and primary production. In addition, research and development programs for managing pest species need to integrate the interests of both primary production and environmental conservation.

Regional natural resource management plans and site-based plans provide the best scale and context for developing operational plans to control invasive species. They allow primary production and environmental considerations to be jointly addressed and allow management to be integrated across the local priority vertebrate pests within the scope of other natural resource management priorities.

Review of the 2008 TAP

The EPBC Act requires that a threat abatement plan be reviewed by the Minister at intervals of no longer than five years. The 2008 Threat Abatement Plan for the competition and land degradation by rabbits was reviewed by the Department of the Environment in 2013. The review assessed the progress and effectiveness of the threat abatement plan in: reducing the impacts of rabbits on biodiversity, specifically nationally listed threatened species and ecological communities; and preventing further species and communities from becoming threatened, through research, management and other actions. The review can be accessed at: http://www.environment.gov.au/biodiversity/threatened/publications/tap/competition-and-land-degradation-rabbits. In summary, the review found that:
       * the issues and objectives outlined in the 2008 TAP  were still valid and are likely to remain so into the future
       * rabbits have reached their ecological limit within Australia; threat abatement should therefore focus on minimising their impact rather than preventing further spread
       * there have been several successful eradications of rabbits on offshore islands in the last five years, most notably the eradication from Macquarie Island
       * exclosures have been useful in quantifying the impacts of rabbits on native flora and fauna
       * rabbits inhibit the regeneration of plants at densities as low as 0.5 rabbits per hectare
       * rabbit control programs have often been ad hoc, lacked strategic prioritisation, and have rarely been initiated in order to promote threatened species or ecological community recovery
       * information on the effects of rabbit abundance on pest predators, including prey switching, is limited
       * rabbit control research over the last five years has predominantly focussed on increasing the effectiveness of Rabbit Haemorrhagic Disease, with several new strains identified, and
       * new approaches and educational tools e.g. online manuals, guidelines, factsheets and economic decision models, have been produced to assist land managers implement integrated control programs.
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