Traditional Owners and WWF have called for a formal investigation into the presence of unregistered nets in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park following the recent discovery of three dead dugongs in a net near Cairns.<\/p>\n
The discovery of the dugongs by a navy crew comes on the back of recent anecdotal accounts of sea turtles being targeted for an illegal meat trade in far north Queensland.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u0080\u009cWe are working to conserve these species as best we can while reserving the right to pursue our traditional way of life,\u00e2\u0080\u009d said CEO of the Girringun Aboriginal Corporation Phil Rist, whose organisation represents Traditional Owners south of Cairns.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u0080\u009cIt is highly unlikely that this would have occurred on our sea country because there has been significant investment in management and conservation mechanisms,\u00e2\u0080\u009d Mr Rist said.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u0080\u009cAny illegal harvesting of these species undermines our efforts to balance traditional activities on our lands and seas with conservation.\u00e2\u0080\u009d<\/p>\n
WWF\u00e2\u0080\u0099s Conservation on Country Manager Cliff Cobbo said the loss of three dugongs was a significant blow to the population of threatened species in the southern part of the Great Barrier Reef.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u0080\u009cThese animals are long-lived and very slow to reproduce and so the loss of three individuals from the southern Great Barrier Reef population is a real set-back to recovery efforts,\u00e2\u0080\u009d Mr Cobbo said.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u0080\u009cThe fact that this net had been set so close to the highly populated area of Cairns and was only discovered inadvertently makes you question what is happening further north where there is even less chance of being caught,\u00e2\u0080\u009d Mr Cobbo said.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u0080\u009cIncreased Indigenous capacity is needed in these areas to conserve threatened marine species and police activities such as the illegal harvest of turtles and dugongs.\u00e2\u0080\u009d<\/p>\n
WWF is calling on the Federal Government to dedicate considerable funding from the $3 billion Closing the Gap budget commitment to create new Indigenous ranger positions on land and sea country.<\/p>\n
The Girringun Aboriginal Corporation and the Gudjuda Reference Group are two north Queensland Traditional Owner groups that have entered into conservation agreements with WWF-Australia to improve protection for the Great Barrier Reef\u00e2\u0080\u0099s marine turtles, dugongs and inshore dolphins.<\/p>\n
For more information:<\/p>\n
Charlie Stevens, WWF Media Manager \u00e2\u0080\u0093 Queensland, 0424 649 689
\nCliff Cobbo, Policy Manager – Conservation on Country, 0406 384 288 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Traditional Owners and WWF have called for a formal investigation into the presence of unregistered nets in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park following the recent discovery of three dead dugongs in a net near Cairns. The discovery of the dugongs by a navy crew comes on the back of recent anecdotal accounts of sea […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4259,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-545660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4259"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=545660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/545660\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=545660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=545660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=545660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}