KOALA
Australia-deforestation-for-koalas
Animal agriculture is a major driver of Australia’s faunal extinction crisis
Many native animal species in Australia are at risk of becoming extinct. The key threat to Australian fauna is habitat loss through land clearing, both past and continuing, and the key driver for this clearing is the production of animal products.
Every year over half a billion farmed animals are bred, raised and killed for food in Australia. The UN has identified animal agriculture as ‘one of the most significant contributors to today’s most serious environmental problems, including global warming, species extinction, loss of freshwater, forest destruction, air and water pollution, acid rain, salinity, soil erosion and loss of habitat.
The WWF-Australia study estimates that tree clearing in Queensland alone kills about 34 million native mammals, birds and reptiles every year, comprising 900,000 mammals, 2.6 million birds and 30.6 million reptiles.
Bulldozing of habitat, past and ongoing, is a major factor in the 80% decline of koalas in Queensland’s Koala Coast.
The Leadbeater’s possum was thought extinct in the 1950s, rediscovered in the 1960s, but now appears to be on its way to extinction because of habitat loss.
Koalas at risk for extinction due to agriculture human activity
Global wildlife populations have fallen by 60 percent since 1970, and koalas are declining at an even faster rate.
WWF-Australia estimates there are less than 20,000 koalas left in New South Wales (NSW). At the current rate, koalas are on track to be extinct in the state by 2050, WWF-Australia conservationist Dr. Stuart Blanch said.
Satellite imagery shows a massive spike in the destruction of NSW koala forests, with the rate of tree clearing tripling in the state’s north since the axing of the NSW Native Vegetation Act in August 2017.
The removal of laws protecting koala forests led to the bulldozing of more than 5,000 hectares of koala habitat in the NSW districts of Moree and Collarenebri at a rate of about 14 football fields a day, a report by WWF-Australia and the NSW Nature Conservation Council found.
“When those trees are cleared, koalas are killed when the trees fall down or when they are crushed by bulldozers,” Blanch said.
They also die when they are forced onto the ground to find new habitat, because they become vulnerable to attacks by dogs and collisions with vehicles.
They also become stressed, and thus become more susceptible to contracting diseases.
Author: Amanda Schmidt, AccuWeather staff writer
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