Conservationists urge Sussan Ley to get her priorities right, saying her job is to protect species, not industries

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Victoria’s faunal emblem, the tiny Leadbeater’s possum, will keep its critically endangered listing after the environment minister, Sussan Ley, rejected a push by Coalition MPs and the forestry industry to downgrade its conservation status.

But Ley has been criticised for suggesting a long-delayed recovery plan for the possum should also consider the needs of the timber industry.

The possum, which was believed extinct until 1961 and is endemic to the Victorian central highlands, was listed as critically endangered in 2015 when then environment minister Greg Hunt accepted the advice of an independent scientific advisory body.

Leadbeater's possum: conservationists say draft report proves endangered status Read more

But the government is yet to release a formal recovery plan for the species and its conservation status has been subject to a review since 2017, when Barnaby Joyce led a call for a “people before possums” approach to prevent forestry job losses.

Scientists estimate the number of Leadbeater’s possums has declined more than 80% since the mid-1980s as its habitat, mostly old-growth mountain ash, has been devastated by a combination of fire and logging. Almost half of it was lost in the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires.

Victoria’s state-owned timber agency, VicForests, says it is managing protection of the possum appropriately and many new colonies of the animal have been found in recent years.

Ley told the ABC on Monday that she was “encouraged by the forestry’s willingness to engage in the possum’s survival”. She said her decision would ensure the animal received the protection it needed, including a 200-metre barrier around known nesting trees.

She said it was important to strike a balance between conservation and the timber industry. “I look forward to a recovery plan that takes into account the needs of that timber industry,” she said.

The Australian Conservation Foundation nature campaigner Jess Abrahams welcomed the minister’s decision, but said the recovery plan must prioritise the environment

“The science is really clear. The species is on the brink of extinction. Her job is to protect threatened species, not to protect threatened industries,” he said.

“I think the minister needs to make sure she’s got her priorities right.”

'The Franklin would be dammed today': Australia's shrinking environmental protections Read more

Abrahams said the case highlighted the weakness of Australian environment law, which requires that endangered species habitat be identified, but not that it be protected. He contrasted this with the US, which requires that habitat critical for endangered species’ survival be identified and maintained.

VicForests corporate affairs general manager Alex Messina said the organisation believed the possum could be protected while addressing both industry and environmental needs.

He said it had been at the forefront of Leadbeater’s possum research, helping identify hundreds of new colonies and extending knowledge about the possum’s habitat.

“We support undertaking further research to gain a greater understanding of Leadbeater’s Possum numbers and where they live,” he said.

Environment group the Friends of the Leadbeater’s Possum has launched a federal court challenge to VicForests’ plans to log 41 forest coupes said to be vital habitat for the possum and the vulnerable greater glider.

Ley also listed five Queensland frog species – the elegant frog, rattling nursery frog, Mount Elliot nursery frog, mountain-top nursery frog and the Bellenden Ker nursery frog – as critically endangered and a sixth, the tapping nursing frog, as endangered.