Page 4638 - Week 15 - Wednesday, 15 December 1993
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ENVIRONMENT STRATEGY - DRAFT FOR PUBLIC COMMENT
Paper
MR WOOD (Minister for Education and Training, Minister for the Arts and Minister for the Environment, Land and Planning) (3.02): Madam Speaker, for the information of members, I present a draft for public comment of the ACT environment strategy, and I move:
That the Assembly takes note of the paper.
In October this year I presented to the Assembly an outline of the Government's progress towards achieving an ecologically sustainable future for the ACT. Later in that month, I released a discussion paper on the development of integrated environment protection legislation. Today, I am delighted to release for public comment a draft environment strategy for the ACT, which will set the framework for the management of our environment well into the next century. I intend making the draft strategy widely available from today, and I look forward to receiving comments on it from all sectors of the community until the end of February next year.
The draft strategy has been prepared in the wake of a number of international, national and local developments. You would all be aware that over the past two years the environment has been the focal point for many international and national projects. Since the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development over a year ago, governments throughout the world have been putting into effect the commitments they made during that conference. I am referring particularly to the United Nations Framework Convention on Environment Change and the Convention on Biological Diversity. Through actively implementing environmental initiatives associated with climate change and biodiversity at the local level, the ACT is playing an important part in helping Australia meet its international commitments in these areas.
The ACT has also been a keen participant in the development and implementation of the national strategy for ecologically sustainable development, the national greenhouse response strategy, and the intergovernmental agreement on the environment, all of which were finalised last year. The international, national and local environmental developments which have occurred over the last 18 months provide a sound background against which we can determine the ACT's environmental goals for the future and assess the policies and actions needed to meet those goals. Furthermore, the draft strategy has been developed as a means to achieve the ecologically sustainable future described in the Government's report "Choosing our Future: Canberra in the year 2020". It complements the environmental goals and targets already identified in that report and provides a more detailed analysis of how these can be achieved.
The underlying goal of this draft strategy is to enhance the components of the environment and maintain their functional integrity. This will involve the maintenance of stable soils, biological diversity and high-quality air and water. In areas where parts of the environment have been degraded, it will be necessary to continue to identify and implement appropriate restoration programs. Another goal of this draft strategy is to improve the amenity of the ACT and provide a healthy environment for present and future residents.
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