Issues

• Values: what do we need to sustain?
• Constraints
• SoE and Limits to Knowledge

• Atmosphere
• Land
• Inland Waters and Wetlands
• Biodiversity
• Settlements
• Cultural Heritage
• Coastal, Estuarine and Marine

• Response Instruments
• Summary of Report Recommendations
• Strategic Recommendations
• Conclusion

Our understanding of a number of environmental and natural resources issues has improved since the previous SoE Report, including capacity to report on conditions and trends. For some issues, information is no longer a significant constraint in implementing best-practice management. Sufficient information is available to guide management responses and to improve community understanding of environmental and natural resource issues in Tasmania.

Nevertheless, the focus and coverage of the monitoring undertaken in Tasmania is a key influence on the capacity of this SoE Report to fulfill its legislative responsibility under the State Policies and Projects Act 1993. The focus of monitoring effort is a key influence on capacity of this SoE Report to assess conditions, trends and changes, resource management objectives, and to provide recommendations for future action. Environmental and natural resource managers are required to manage the environment and resources, on behalf of the community, with considerable uncertainty in a number of areas. There are a number of examples across the report, including:

• Groundwater
   
• Contaminated Sites
   
• Ecological Condition of Coastal, Estuarine and Marine Habitats
   
• Heritage Places and Features
   

In relation to SoE reporting and the capacity to fulfil the requirements of the legislation, the following monitoring issues need to be taken into consideration.

• Monitoring environmental 'hotspots': These are places where natural systems have been substantially modified or major environmental priorities have been identified. Examples would include downstream from sites of acid mine drainage, the problem of particulate pollution in Launceston, or the concentration of marine pest species around major ports around Tasmania. Monitoring of environmental hotspots provides scientifically based information to understand and direct management effort towards remediation and prevention of further environmental damage. In contrast to monitoring of hot spots is the collection of continuous data over a number of sites that are representative of a range of environmental conditions. It is the latter which is most useful for SoE reporting in identifying widespread, long-term, and, potentially, subtle trends and changes. Detailed site-specific monitoring can also be relevant for SoE Reporting provided it is not presented as representative of overall Tasmanian conditions and trends.
   
• Monitoring commercial species: Monitoring often also tends to favour the most current commercially important natural capital assets. For example, more is known about forests than, for example, native grasslands or wetlands. Similarly more is usually known about the ecology and life cycle of a commercially important fish species than other marine species. This emphasis on commercially important species is clearly warranted, although the commercial species themselves and the public interest may also ultimately depend on understanding wider ecological relationships and non-commercial species. In the SoE Report, it has been possible to report on aspects of forest condition and extent, but less information is available on non-commercial significant vegetation communities. For some species, basic information on distribution is not available.
   
• Long-term versus short-term monitoring: Environmental change typically requires long-term monitoring in order to identify actual change from seasonal and other shorter-term influences. Budget processes and institutional arrangements generally do not support monitoring beyond a few financial years. There has been a number of key Natural Heritage Trust funded reports undertaken in Tasmania that have assisted in identifying aspects of environmental conditions and trends or threatening processes. However, there is concern at the capacity in Tasmania to respond adequately to the directions and recommendations contained in these reports.
   
• National monitoring priorities: National initiatives have supported monitoring efforts and environmental and natural resource research in Tasmania. The Salinity Audit and the National Land and Water Resources Audit have been significant sources of information for this SoE Report. The Audit has supported information gathering in a broad range of areas such as biodiversity health, estuarine health, wetlands, groundwater, and surface water.
   
• Measuring the effectiveness of management actions: Reliable and repeatable measures to identify the success of management responses in environmental and natural resource management have been difficult to identify in the past, although progress has been made through Natural Heritage Trust (NHT) performance evaluation.
   

Given the above and other influences, a recurring theme through the SoE Report is that, despite the advances in knowledge that have been made over the past five years, there remains much more still to be understood about the Tasmanian environment.