Farmers James and Angelica Smith are set to embark on New England’s biggest ever koala habitat restoration project on their property ‘Ringwood’ near Uralla.
This project is part of an initiative to restore critical koala habitat across 10,000 hectares of privately-owned land throughout NSW. The Koala Friendly Carbon Initiative is a project run in partnership between leading carbon farming service provider, Climate Friendly, and the World Wildlife Fund – Australia (WWF-A), and aims to help private land managers restore diverse forests across previously cleared farmland.
Supported by the NSW Government, the initiative has seen 240,000 koala food and habitat trees and shrubs planted across 261 hectares of previously cleared land on properties located in the northern rivers of NSW, a hotspot for koalas. Expanding koala habitat is seen as key to preventing their predicted extinction along the east coast of Australia.
The maturing forests will also help tackle climate change by sequestering carbon and generating high integrity Australian Carbon Credit Units (ACCUs). The first ACCUs have been issued to Pilot 1 projects and are expected to attract a premium price due to their significant nature co-benefits.
“Koala Friendly Carbon benefits land managers by providing an additional income stream while creating critical havens for endangered koalas and other species,” said Climate Friendly’s Co-CEO Skye Glenday.
“Climate Friendly is committed to helping land managers build their properties’ resilience to drought and flood, while improving their farm productivity.”
A 2020 Parliamentary inquiry into NSW koala populations and habitat found that without action, koalas in NSW could be extinct by 2050. The NSW Government has committed to doubling koala numbers by 2050, developing the NSW Koala Strategy as a roadmap, underpinned by $193.3 million for the first five years.
By accessing part of this funding, WWF-A is able to help private landholders implement forest restoration projects of which the Koala Friendly Carbon Initiative is a flagship model. At 307ha, Ringwood is the most ambitious koala habitat planting to date and the first in the New England region under the Koala Friendly Carbon Initiative.
“We were always aware that environmental planting projects were around, but with tough times in agribusiness when the interest rates were on the rise and livestock prices so low, Ange and I began looking seriously into other passive income streams,” said Ringwood property owner, James Smith.
“Climate Friendly had an information stand at the Armidale Show, so we spoke to Jess who showed us a couple of options including the Koala Friendly Carbon Initiative which really seemed to fit with our on-farm biomass and carbon sequestering potential.”
In consultation with Climate Friendly and WWF-A, landowners James and Angelica Smith have committed over 300ha of their 1600ha property to this Koala Friendly Carbon project, with 200ha of diverse environmental plantings being introduced this year and the remaining 105ha to be planted in the following autumn.
The first of 128,500 trees and shrubs, comprising twenty-three species, were planted by participants at a field day hosted by Climate Friendly at Ringwood on Friday 16th May.
“What we hoped participants would get out of the day was a better understanding of how Environmental Planting carbon projects work,” said Co-CEO of Climate Friendly, Josh Harris.
“A number of Climate Friendly experts made themselves available to talk on various aspects of carbon projects, from eligibility and suitability requirements, the potential to accumulate carbon biomass, plant community types and species selection, and the financial benefits of recognised high integrity carbon plantings through the Accounting for Nature system.”
An important aspect of the plant species being used in this project is the collection of endemic plant varieties which have been collected by local native seed harvesting operation Field’s Environmental Solutions (BioBank Seed) based in Uralla. This ensures the revegetation of cleared agricultural areas is engineered to maintain naturally occurring and acclimatised species to form a continuation of the surrounding forest from which fauna can move freely and expand their territory over time.
By providing funding and expertise to land managers, Koala Friendly Carbon projects incentivise the cultivation of koala habitats through the generation of ACCUs sold with a biodiversity premium. A portion of these revenues are paid into a revolving fund that is reinvested into new planting projects to achieve a self-sustaining planting fund.
Landholders are taking advantage of opportunities to regenerate their land and improve their properties providing greater potential for environmental resilience and income. Carbon farming activities deliver many important benefits to the land itself, creating a win-win situation for landholders – healthier land, increased production and a passive income stream for added financial security.
Climate Friendly and WWF-Australia aim to scale up the plantings across private properties in NSW and Queensland over the next few years.
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