Analysis

Paul Martin Director, Australian Centre for Agriculture and Law, University of New England Amy Cosby Researcher, Centre for Agriculture and Law, University of New England Kip Werren Lecturer in Law, University of New England Extinction threatens iconic Australian birds and animals. The regent honeyeater, the orange-bellied parrot, and Leadbeater’s possum have all entered the list of critically endangered species. It is too late for the more than 50 species that are already extinct, including bettongs, various wallabies, and many others. Despite international commitments, policies and projects, Australia’s biodiversity outcomes remain unsatisfactory. A 2015 review of Australia’s 2010-2050 Biodiversity Conservation Strategy found that it has failed to “effectively guide the efforts of governments, other organisations or individuals”. Insufficient resourcing is one cause of biodiversity loss. The challenge is impressive. Australia must tackle degradation and fragmentation of habitat, invasive species, unsustainable use of resources, the deterioration of the aquatic environment and water flows, increased fire events, and climate change. This all requires money to support private landholders conducting conservation activities, to fund research, to manage public lands, and to support other conservation activities conducted by governments, industry, and individuals. So where can we find the funds? How much money is needed? We have estimated that Australia’s biodiversity protection requires an equivalent investment to defence spending – roughly 2% of gross domestic product. Of course, such estimates are up for debate given that how much money is required depends on what we want the environment to look like, which methods we use, and how well they work. Other studies (see also here and here point to a similar conclusion: far more money is needed to achieve significantly better outcomes. Apart from government funding, private landholders, businesses, communities, Indigenous Australians, and non-government organisations contribute significantly to natural resource management. We were unable to quantify […]

www.themirrorinspires.com Making Boris Johnson – who led the Brexit campaign and has the same hairdresser as Donald Trump – Foreign Minister is sure to go down as one of the more memorial appointments in British political history. And this is before he even does a day’s work or finds his coffee cup! I can see European ministers running a mile when Boris comes to visit suddenly finding their appointment books full. The appointment is of the calibre of making Rowan Atkinson captain of the England first eleven. As the UK representative for decisionmaking with European and world leaders for world stability and peace this appointment is sure to make a lot of people very nervous. Can you imagine a meeting between Johnson and John Kerry? Or Johnson and Julie Bishop? And Boris has the task of making Brexit work. He is not liked in Brussels and may well be laughed out of Europe.He offended Obama and the list of overseas leaders he has offended is becoming more and more impressive!

Global Affairs As policies, the recent developments in Britain seem irrational. But the problems underpinning the Brexit vote really aren’t about policies, so they aren’t amenable to policy analysis and solutions.  By Philip Bobbitt Of the millions of words written in the past few days about Brexit — the British vote to leave the European Union — the word “State” has seldom appeared. Very few commentators seem to appreciate the one concept that unites the otherwise disparate and paradoxical elements of the Brexit vote. For unless one appreciates that the driving historical force that has brought us to this impasse is the decay of one constitutional order, the industrial nation-state, and the emergence of its successor, the informational market state, the crises brought on by Brexit will simply confound us. We need conceptual tools to make sense of these phenomena, the first of which is that the most economically vulnerable persons in the United Kingdom and those who have suffered most under the British government’s policy of austerity voted in favor of Brexit with the full knowledge that it would, in all likelihood, turn an estimated positive growth in GDP to a negative and plunge the economy into recession, jeopardizing the entitlements and falling prices on which these persons depend. Indeed, considerable numbers of voters in economically depressed areas that receive significant amounts of EU aid voted to leave the bloc. The second phenomenon is that, having won the battle to keep Scotland in the United Kingdom, the government has taken the one step — because it is irrevocable — that now puts secession back on the table, not only in Scotland but also in Wales, which voted for the Brexit. Moreover, a campaign against the “democratic deficit” in Brussels has led to the removal of a prime minister democratically […]