The Federal Government has ramped up its campaign to prevent the Great Barrier Reef from being declared "in danger", appointing a taskforce to coordinate the lobbying effort.

Over the last 12 months environment minister Greg Hunt has met ministers and delegates from Serbia, Croatia, Malaysia, Colombia and Germany.

All are on the United Nations World Heritage Committee, which is deciding whether to place the Great Barrier Reef on the "in danger" list.

Mr Hunt met the German delegates twice, most recently in January this year. He met minister of state Maria Bohmer, who is chairing the World Heritage Committee meeting in June.

According to the German Foreign Office, Mr Hunt stressed that the reef had very comprehensive protective measures and had tightened the legal framework conditions for use in order to meet the demands of the World Heritage Committee.

In September last year, Mr Hunt attended the International Whaling Commission conference in Serbia and used the trip to lobby a number of World Heritage Committee nations.

On the whistle-stop European visit, he met ministers from Croatia, Serbia and again Germany.

The trip for the minister and his chief of staff cost $41,000, three-quarters of which was spent on the whaling conference.

Got a confidential news tip? Email ABC Investigations at investigations@abc.net.au For more sensitive information: Text message using the Signal phone app +61 436 369 072 No system is 100 per cent secure, but the Signal app uses end-to-end encryption and can protect your identity. Please read the terms and conditions.

In Senate Estimates earlier this year, the secretary of the department of foreign affairs said there was a "whole-of-government" effort to prevent the reef being placed on the "in danger" list.

"We are running a major campaign to prevent a listing of the Great Barrier Reef as being in danger," he said.

"There have been a number of assertions made about the management of the Great Barrier Reef and about its vulnerability that are not grounded in fact and which need to be rebutted.

"We have tasked several of our heads of mission ... to make that clear to the investment community."

The Department of Foreign Affairs has set up a Great Barrier Reef Taskforce to coordinate the lobbying effort, led by Tiffany McDonald.

Ms McDonald was the former director of the Pakistan and Central Asia section of DFAT in Canberra.

Heritage Committee to make final decision later this year

Last year the Committee deferred a decision on the reef until this year's meeting in June.

Many committee members flagged serious concerns with the decision to approve the expansion of the Abbot Point coal terminal near Bowen in north Queensland.

The terminal's expansion would have involved the dumping of three million cubic tonnes of dredge spoil in the marine park area, around 20 kilometres from the reef.

"We acknowledge with concerns the range of threats facing this exceptional example of [Outstanding Universal Value]," the Jamaican delegation said at the time.

"Based purely on the evidence referenced by the experts, it is clear that the integrity of the site is at risk.

"We would wish to encourage the State Party [Australia] to urgently review its recent decisions regarding development projects."

The Federal Government responded in January this year with a formal ban on all dredge spoil dumping on the Great Barrier Reef, instead proposing to dump the waste on-shore in a non-classified area.

Environmentalists remain concerned with the Abbot Point alternative, dumping in the Caley Valley wetlands, though that decision is now on hold.