22 June, 2015

Northern Australia plans ignore the 'elephant in the room' - climate!


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onsiderations about the development of northern Australia already mentioned on Beneath the Wisteria have been echoed by Steve Turton writing on The Conversation.

The Professor of Environmental Geography at James Cook University argued that a recently released white paper on developing northern Australia ignored the elephant in the room: climate change.

“While the paper sees a bright future for the north (roads, rail, dams and food), without considering climate change we can’t be sure the north will even be liveable.

“The white paper also fails to take into account other environmental constraints such as water and soils,” he writes.

On Friday morning Prime Minister Tony Abbott, together with his deputy Warren Truss, Trade Minister Andrew Robb and Federal Leichhardt MP Warren Entsch, spoke passionately to a packed breakfast in Cairns about his government’s vision for Northern Australia, with Abbott describing the white paper as a landmark report for the north.

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