The Australian Feral Camel Management Project
The Australian Feral Camel Management Project Conference Paper
15th Australasian Vertebrate Pest Conference
- Author(s): Hart, Q
- Secondary Author(s): Saunders, G, Lane, C
- Published: 2011
Abstract: The Australian Feral Camel Management Project (AFCMP) is one of the largest and most diverse nationwide collaborations ever to be targeted at an established pest species in Australia. The project is working with a large number of partners and stakeholders to mitigate the impact of feral camels on desert ecosystems, the pastoral industry, remote Aboriginal communities and public safety. It has a solid information base through the foundational work of the Desert Knowledge CRC (DKCRC Report 47, available at www.feralcamels.com.au) which guided the overarching project objective to reduce the feral camel density to <0.1 animals per square kilometre at priority biodiversity areas. Since a four-year agreement between Ninti One Ltd and the Australian Government’s Caring for Our Country program was signed in February 2010, the AFCMP has made substantial progress based on an early realisation of the need for comprehensive collaboration processes due to the diverse range of land tenures (Aboriginal, conservation estate, pastoral and Crown) across which feral camels roam and the diverse stakeholder interests, including commercial use. Under the guidance of a representative Steering Committee, project partners are working effectively together to develop and implement agreed approaches to manage an established pest animal at priority sites across different land tenures and all state/territory boundaries within the feral camel’s huge range (three million square kilometres) for the first time. A comprehensive evaluation plan has been developed to assess the biophysical, socio-economic and governance performance of the project, including: the extent of engagement with landholders and other stakeholders; capacity building for long-term camel removal; and collaboration with other monitoring processes to assess the impacts of feral camels. The AFCMP is engaging with two themes that were highlighted at the 2010 50th Ecological Society of Australia conference: the need to develop workable solutions to biodiversity issues based on informed stakeholder preferences and learning by doing; and combining Aboriginal and Western ecological knowledge for land management solutions.
- Urls: https://web.archive.org/web/20130515153046/http://www.feral.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/15thAVPC_Proceedings_June2011.pdf
- Publisher Location: Sydney