UNESCO World Heritage Committee Rejects Forest De-listing Claim

Wednesday 25 June 2014 @ 10.25 a.m. | Legal Research

In a decision reported as taking "all of seven minutes", the UNESCO's World Heritage Committee (the Committee) has rejected a request from the Australian Federal Government (the Federal Government) seeking the approval of the Committee for what the Federal Government claimed was "a minor modification" to the boundaries of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Site.

The request made on 31 January 2014 followed on the Federal Government's promises to assist with the reactivation of logging in Tasmania made during the Tasmanian State elections, promises made mostly on the basis of reversing many of the Heritage Listing decisions made under the Tasmanian State Forest Agreement by the previous Labor Federal Government and Labor Tasmanian State Government  (for more on this, see our previous article, Tasmanian Government to Rebuild Forestry Industry by Repealing Tasmanian Forests Agreement Act.

The Federal Government's Case for De-Listing

The basis of arguing for the de-listing put by the Federal Government was that the 74,000 hectares of forest in question could not be considered to have World Heritage Values because they had previously had plantation forest on them and been affected by previous logging. An argument somewhat at odds even with the Government's own Federal Environment Department who told a Senate inquiry in the de-listing bid that only four percent of the 74,000 hectares had been heavily disturbed.

The Committee's Decision

The Committee at its 38th session (sitting between 15-25 June 2014), was yesterday (24 June 2014) reported as having "summarily dismissed the Abbott government's bid to wind back protection of Tasmanian forests".

It was reported that the committee meeting in Doha (Qatar) . . . "took just seven minutes to consider the bid, which member nation Portugal called 'feeble', and setting an unacceptable precedent for the future".

It is reported that not a single country represented on the Committee spoke in favour of the Federal Government's bid to de-list some 74,00 hectares of old-growth forest.

This was an action which the official cultural and natural values advisers reporting to the Committee told the Committee would weaken the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area. Colombia and Germany supported the recommendation to reject the de-listing, while Portugal spoke at length defending the World Heritage system and indicating the:

". . . justifications presented to the reduction are to say the least feeble, . . . Accepting this de-listing today would be setting an unacceptable precedent impossible to deny in similar circumstances in the future. If this committee cares for conservation according to responsible engagement of states parties to the convention when they submit their nominations, we cannot accept these requests to de-list."

From this, it seems that as much as the Committee took the view that the Federal Government's claim was "feeble" or poorly based, it also took the view that there was an inherent danger to the whole concept of World Heritage Listing if it allowed countries to easily amend and de-list areas already entered as being of "World Heritage Value". In this respect the view expressed in an article in The Conversation (19 June 2014) is worth noting:

"The debate around Tasmania’s controversial World Heritage extension, under review this week at international talks in Doha, has centred on forests. But the area includes far more than “just” trees — including unique geology and landforms and indigenous culture.

There is nothing to suggest these values have been recognised in the current political squabbling over forests, but the results will determine the future of these important places."

As the article goes on to point out, the current Federal and Tasmanian State Governments, in seeking to de-list 74,000 hectares of the extended Heritage area, on grounds that this area includes degraded forests which should be open for harvesting,  fail to take into account that to qualify as Heritage Areas in the first place, a site has to meet 10 criteria (six relating to cultural heritage and four relating to national heritage), a further reason for the Committee's rejection of the Federal Government's de-listing bid:

"Tasmania is one of only 29 sites that satisfy both cultural and natural heritage values. But even more impressively, the area satisfies seven of the ten criteria, including unique human culture and history, wilderness, plants and wildlife, and geology."

In other words, the listing is not just about the forest or even the trees but the value of the area as a whole.

Reaction

The Prime Minister is reported as saying that the government was ''disappointed with the decision'' and indicated that,

"We [the Government] will be carefully looking at the decision and deciding what’s best now, . . .''

While the Environment Minister and the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Agriculture, Tasmanian Senator Mr Richard Colbeck, are reported as saying "the government had honoured an election commitment by seeking the boundary change".

The opposition’s environment spokesman Mr Mark Butler is reported as saying that the proposal should never have gone to the committee because: 

‘‘Australians do not support Tony Abbott’s ‘dig it up, chop it down’ attitude,  . . .’’

Greens Leader Christine Milne is reported as saying the decision was:

". . . another case of the Abbott government humiliating Australia on the global stage. It clearly was a humiliation for Australia, and so it should have been, because it would have been a shocking precedent if governments can just fiddle with the boundaries of their world heritage areas, destroy outstanding universal values, just for cheap politics, . . .''

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