Page 734 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 31 March 2021
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Each of the strategy’s six objectives has a series of actions with specified time frames. The objectives provide for a wide range of actions, including protecting the urban forest, such as through reforms to legislation, which I look forward to bringing forward later in the term; ensuring a resilient forest, including through the renewal of ageing trees and the planting of species suitable for a changing climate; ensuring a balanced and diverse forest through the prioritisation of planting locations and species selection; fostering biodiversity, such as through enhanced management of remnant trees and the establishment of wildlife corridors; providing space for trees to foster a livable city, such as through better urban planning and design and increasing the proportion of permeable surfaces; and partnering with the community through our community engagement team, citizen science, and incentives for retaining trees on private land.
Pursuing these six objectives together will mean that we can protect and maintain our existing green canopy, make it more resilient and diverse, and continue to expand it over time towards the clear 30 per cent tree canopy target or equivalent that our government has set, both in the Living Infrastructure Plan and in the Urban Forest Strategy.
Ensuring that the clear actions in the strategy are measurable and transparent is essential. Many actions in the strategy have already commenced, with others to be implemented or expanded according to the time frames laid out in the document. By the end of this year, I look forward to presenting the Assembly with an implementation plan that will provide a more detailed account of how each action will be achieved.
Equity is a really important value underpinning the strategy. We know that some parts of Canberra benefit from greater canopy cover than others do. Accompanying the Urban Forest Strategy implementation plan will be an estimation of the contribution that different geographic regions of Canberra will make to achieving the canopy cover target, as well as the list of high-priority suburbs that will receive targeted efforts to increase their canopy.
A very clear part of the plan was making sure that we plant new trees in areas that have low canopy cover. That is our greenfield suburbs, like areas of Gungahlin and, particularly, the Molonglo Valley, but there will be others in the future. It takes time for trees to grow up, but we also need to make sure that there is room for trees in those suburbs, going forward. That is part of the work that has been undertaken in parallel, in consultation with the community on DV 369, which would look at at least 15 per cent of tree canopy cover being on private land. We also need to factor in the contribution on public land, to make sure that we can reach that 30 per cent tree canopy cover or equivalent right across the suburbs.
It is a key feature of the strategy that we focus on areas with low canopy cover as well as replacing trees in the existing canopy cover that have died. There are a number of trees that are expected to die over the coming years, as they reach the end of their natural life and as a result of climate change. As we plant our new species, we will need to make sure that they are species that can grow and adapt to a hotter and drier climate, going forward.
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