Insights on the relationship between total grazing pressure management and sustainable land management: key indicators to verify impacts

Demonstrating sustainable land management (SLM) requires an understanding of the linkages between grazing management and environmental stewardship. Grazing management practices that incorporate strategic periods of rest are promoted internationally as best practice. However, spatial and temporal trends in unmanaged feral (goat) and native (kangaroo) populations in the southern Australian rangelands can result land managers having, at times, control over less than half the grazing pressure, precluding the ability to rest pastures. Few empirical studies have examined the impacts of total grazing pressure (TGP) on biodiversity and resource condition, while the inability to manage grazing intensity at critical times may result in negative impacts on ground cover, changes in pasture species composition, increased rates of soil loss and reduce the ability for soils to store carbon. The widespread adoption of TGP control through exclusion fencing in the southern Australian rangelands has created unprecedented opportunities to manage total grazing pressure, although there is little direct evidence that this infrastructure leads to more sustainable land management. Here we identify several key indicators that are either outcome- or activity-based that could serve as a basis for verification of the impacts of TGP management. Since TGP is the basic determinant of the impact of herbivory on vegetation it follows that the ability for rangeland pastoral management to demonstrate SLM and environmental stewardship will rely on using evidence-based indicators to support environmental social licence to operate.

Using economic, social and ecological spatial patterns to guide policy development in the Pilbara and Southern Rangelands of Western Australia

The pastoral industry in the Pilbara and Southern Rangelands of Western Australia continues to face very difficult economic, social and ecological situations due to decline in terms of trade and ongoing decline in range condition. Land administration by State government for the pastoral industry has a strong focus on environmental and ecological sustainability but these goals have largely not been achieved. Regional planning and incentive-based approaches have either failed or only been partly successful at pastoral lease scale. This paper identifies four broad economic, social and ecological landscape patterns ranging from economic, social and ecological sustainability to failure across all three dimensions. Some lessees are adapting to economic decline by obtaining work off station or diversification in the limited locations where these opportunities are available, in some cases facilitating landscape restoration. Market-based incentives may be effective where economic viability is attainable but lease buy-back may be required where leaseholders are locked into a poverty cycle. Carbon-based income is problematic until governance and economic parameters are resolved. Mapping the economic, social and ecological patterns in the landscape is a basis for policy and special purpose initiatives to resolve the current very difficult economic, social and environmental situation in the Pilbara and Southern Rangelands.

Alternative strategies for management of feral goats: implications for natural resource management policies in New South Wales rangelands

Feral goats (Capra hircus) are increasing in abundance and distribution in the semi-arid and arid rangelands of New South Wales, and elsewhere in the southern rangelands. They present a conundrum for natural resource managers and policy-makers as they can be both an agricultural and environmental pest and an economic resource for landholders. This paper presents an economic analysis of a range of alternative approaches to feral goat management and assesses their implications for natural resource management policies. ‘Opportunistic harvesting’ and ‘value-added’ strategies (the latter involving use of a paddock to increase the liveweight of feral goats before slaughter for meat) returned positive net benefits to landholders, whereas the strategy of ‘no management’ resulted in a negative net benefit if the overall stocking rate was held constant. The erection of goat-proof boundary fencing to enhance production from domestic livestock generated negative net benefits unless increases in stocking rates of domestic livestock could be achieved within the exclusion fencing through improved grazing management. The use of goat-proof fencing to establish an individual paddock for domestic livestock production returned positive net benefit for landholders but also required increases in domestic stocking rate to be competitive with the best feral goat harvesting strategy. The ‘opportunistic harvesting’ and ‘value added’ strategies are thus likely to be adopted by producers without financial incentive and could result in positive resource conservation outcomes if goat prices encourage harvesting. The ‘no management’ strategy will most likely promote resource degradation and should be discouraged. Strategies involving goat-proof fencing are likely to provide positive net benefits for landholders and achieve positive natural resource outcomes if associated with improved grazing management, and reduced density of feral goats outside the exclusion fencing. It is concluded that resource conservation benefits of feral goat control strategies may be positive, negative, or neutral depending on the management strategy adopted, the extent of goat-proof fencing, and the price of meat from feral goats. It is, therefore, difficult to rely on the commercial harvesting of feral goats to achieve resource conservation objectives. Public funds could be better used to support education and training in grazing management and provide incentives for achievement of measurable natural resource outcomes than to support infrastructure establishment for the harvesting of feral goats on private properties.