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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
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Parliamentary Committees

Natural Resources Committee: Kangaroo Island Natural Resources Management Region

The Hon. S.W. KEY (Ashford) (11:13): I move:

That the 100th report of the committee, entitled Kangaroo Island NRM Region Fact-Finding Visit, 5-7 November 2014, be noted.

In early November 2014, the Natural Resources Committee visited the Kangaroo Island Natural Resources Management region. This was the committee's first visit to the island since 2009. As with previous committee visits, vegetation management remained a source of debate. Kangaroo Islanders face a number of disadvantages compared to mainland South Australia: higher transport costs, longer times to ship produce from the island and difficulties in attracting investment were mentioned many times by witnesses.

It was clear that there was a difference of opinion between the Kangaroo Island Council and Natural Resources Kangaroo Island over what constitutes proper development on the island. Members heard that a number of proposed developments had been unable to proceed. The committee suggests that the soon-to-be appointed Kangaroo Island commissioner may be well placed to bring the two sides together.

Issues that concerned the Kangaroo Island Council, in particular, were roadside vegetation clearance for improved road safety, marine parks legislation and plantation forestry. The council suggested that it needed to have greater control over roadside vegetation and has criticised the veto DEWNR has on development proposals which require referrals to the Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation.

The council, I believe, is in a difficult position. While further development of the island is desirable to ensure its long-term future, development needs to be sensitive to the island's unique qualities. Maintaining biodiversity and the integrity of native vegetation, including on roadsides, is important for wildlife and also for tourists, in particular high-value overseas tourists. Members were impressed with the work of the DEWNR animal and pest plant control officers who were in the final stages of removing feral goats and deer and also attempting to tackle more difficult pests, including feral cats and feral pigs with limited resourcing.

Koala management, one of my favourite topics, is continuing to be an issue for Kangaroo Island. Committee members were made aware of the high recurring cost of the sterilisation program and some members of our committee wondered whether it might be more cost effective for a non-government organisation to do this work. However, committee members understood that it would be unfair to compare the cost of managing feral animals with that of managing koalas, given that culling is still not an option. Koalas and their negative impacts on vegetation need continued management, with consideration also given to their role as a tourist drawcard.

Committee members were also impressed with the efforts of two entrepreneurial landholders involved in marron farming. They saw considerable potential for these enterprises to expand, building on the island's clean, green reputation and relatively abundant water resources. However, there are some hurdles, particularly in the area of predation of marron by birds.

I wish to thank all of those who gave their time to assist the committee with this visit. In particular, I thank the member for Finniss who made time to meet the committee even though it was a very difficult time for him with his mother passing on the final day of our visit. The committee sent the member for Finniss a condolence card after our visit, and I take this opportunity to put on record the committee's heartfelt condolences to the member for Finniss on the passing of Mrs Maureen Pengilly on 7 November 2014.

I commend the members of the committee: the members for Napier, Kaurna and Flinders, and the Hons Robert Brokenshire MLC, John Dawkins MLC and Gerry Kandelaars MLC for their contributions to the work of the committee and also this report. All members have worked cooperatively on this report, as they do in usual times. Finally, I thank the committee staff for their assistance: Patrick Dupont, who is our executive officer, and our former research officer, David Trebilcock. I commend this report to the house.

Mr PENGILLY (Finniss) (11:18): I indicate my support for the report. I would like to put on the record my appreciation to the member for Ashford and the members of the committee for their kind words regarding my mother's recent passing. For the record, my mother was the first woman elected to local government on Kangaroo Island. Anyway, that is another story.

The committee has shown a predisposition for visiting the island from time to time, which I think is to be commended, and I was very grateful that the committee went in November last year for a couple of days to look at a number of issues. There are always issues on Kangaroo Island—there always will be—and it is interesting to pick up on what the member for Ashford said because only on the weekend I found, while searching through my mother's possessions, a document entitled 'Kangaroo Island: a tourism planning statement' from the early 1990s. Surprise, surprise—the more things change, the more things stay the same. It is quite remarkable what is encapsulated there, including the need for a lodge.

There are a few things that I think need to be said. I note the comments regarding DEWNR and Kangaroo Island Council. My view is that the council has taken a quantum leap forward since the election, with the election of Peter Clements as mayor. They are a whole lot easier to deal with, and I think they have a different picture of where the island needs to go. It will not be as confrontational as it has been in the past, so that is a step forward.

Land clearance, moving trees, putting things in and taking things out will always be controversial, and one of the biggest impediments is the bureaucracy that reigns supreme for anybody who wants to put forward a development of some sort or another. They seem to become weighed down by state bureaucrats and, to a lesser extent, by council staff who are pressured by state bureaucrats. It is a sad thing.

The Presiding Member picked up on the transport costs and whatnot. This is one area where the government, through its organisation KIFA, has completely failed to act. They wanted to mess around with the warm and cuddly things, but they have not dealt with the issue of transport costs between the mainland and Kangaroo Island. Until that matter is dealt with, in tandem with the federal government of both persuasions, I might add (I can give them a smack around the ears as well), the island is going to be held to ransom. I know the minister for primary industries yesterday talked about the premium of $60 a tonne that Kangaroo Island farmers got for canola. That is all fine; however, what he failed to mention was that it costs them $50 a tonne to get it off the island for a start, and that is all part and parcel of it.

I also note that the committee report mentions the commissioner. To my way of thinking, the commissioner is not going to be worth a tinker's damn. It is a con and always has been. It is another level of bureaucracy. It is three days a week. It is a fool of an idea, quite frankly. I think the islanders have been conned on that, but we will wait and see. The interviews were held three weeks ago and still no commissioner has been announced, so I do not know what is going on there. Members of the government may be able to find out, but I am not holding my breath over it at all. In fact, I think that it is going to create more problems than it is worth.

I note the member's comments regarding marron farming. Marron farming has always been an interesting profession. Indeed, my brother-in-law was one of the first on the island to try marron when he had his farming property. Mr John Melbourne at Andermel has quite a large facility out there with ponds, but I suspect that the profitability level is not high. He has spent an enormous amount of money putting in dams, vineyards and everything else. As one fellow who has been in marron for a good number of years explained to me, the people who are poaching them out of the national parks and out of the dams are probably doing better than anybody else because their costs of production are not as high. It is an issue.

I think that National Parks and DEWNR need to look at what they are trying to stop when prosecuting people for poaching marron in national parks because they are an introduced species from Western Australia, and they are a menace. I understand they are a menace to platypus, which is also an introduced species to Kangaroo Island. The member for Ashford talked about koalas, which is also an introduced species to Kangaroo Island.

This madness about sterilising koalas has gone on for what must be nine or 10 years now at a cost of millions and millions of dollars. It was very controversial. I think I was mayor at the time when this first came in and the media by and large was urging me to say 'shoot them' for a sensational headline. Let me tell you that I did not say 'shoot them'. John Hill was the minister at the time, but I know and the department knows—and at that time it was all kept pretty quiet—that a good amount of shooting went on. People shut up about it, put them in holes in the ground and reduced the numbers rapidly, yet they are still sterilising koalas. So the couple of million dollars a year or whatever that goes into the sterilising koalas program could be better used, in my view, to do something about the cost of transport to and from the island.

Members also talked about tourism, and high yield international tourism. My point is that the guts of tourism on Kangaroo Island has always been family tourism; mum, dad and the kids. That has always been the backbone of tourism on the island. The international market is terrific but it is only small, let us be realistic. There are 3 million people a year who come to the Fleurieu but there are only 180,000 a year who go to Kangaroo Island.

The cost of getting to the island is killing the family tourism side of it, family visitations. I understand that the cost of going to Seal Bay, for example, is now well over $70 for a family, and that is ludicrous. They have killed the goose that lays the golden egg. Internationals do not know how much they have paid for it; they have just paid for a holiday in Europe or America or wherever, and when they come they go to these places and have no idea what it costs. The backbone for tourism has been the family unit—and so it should be—and we should put our thinking caps on to try to do something about the cost of transport. Not bashing the ferry operator (as some members of the government have done regularly) would be a good start in the process. They are restricted to what they have to do, and let me tell you that no-one would like to drop the charges more than SeaLink, but they have to pay a million dollars a year to the government in wharfage. That would be a good place to start in dropping some of the cost.

We need to keep the families coming, and we need to market for the internationals, sure; we need to keep that going. The Southern Ocean Lodge is promoted regularly on the media and it is sensationally successful, absolutely fantastic. I had my part in getting that up, along with former minister Holloway, and I am very proud of that; however it is no good promoting that because it is $1,800 or $2,000 a night for two. I believe it is a complete fallacy to suggest that tourists who go to the island are going to stay at Southern Ocean Lodge. They want motel or unit accommodation—of which there is plenty—to be able to do that.

The cost of transport to the island is a limiting factor to primary industry, it is a limiting factor to tourism, and it is a limiting factor to the residential component of the island. You need a critical mass in residential population to be able to make something fire, and the critical mass is just not there with just over 4,000 people on the island. During the winter, from after school holidays and Easter onwards, businesses basically go backwards until about September. There are not enough people living there, and efforts by some departments to put dysfunctional families on the island have created more chaos—in education particularly, in crime, and the list goes on.

We need a new industry over there. I do not know what we do regarding a new industry, but we need to wipe out the blue gums on the west end of the island and revert that to farming, that would be a good start. It is high production rainfall country, and it is a dreadful waste while those blue gums remain there. I am afraid I have been hearing about schemes to produce power and biomass ad infinitum but nothing happens. I simply say that we need to get down to business, remove the blue gums and put in place a scheme to get that land back to high production agricultural country. That will lift the centre and west of the island, it will boost business across the island, it will put more kids in the schools, and the list goes on.

In concluding my remarks I again thank the committee, and I thank them for their remarks regarding my family. I support the report.

Mr PICTON (Kaurna) (11:28): It is my pleasure to talk today on the 100th report of the Public Works Committee—

Ms Bedford interjecting:

Mr PICTON: Sorry, the Natural Resources Committee, the hardest working committee of the parliament—

Members interjecting:

Mr PICTON: Annabel just mentioned Public Works, so it was in my head. It is my pleasure to talk today on the 100th report of the Natural Resources Committee, the hardest working committee of the parliament, and I think in this term of parliament it is continuing that hard work by its first trip to Kangaroo Island, which it was my pleasure to take part in.

We had a very packed schedule of visits and events across the wonderful part of South Australia that is Kangaroo Island, and it was very eye opening in terms of the number of issues, as the member for Finniss says, that are on Kangaroo Island, both from a natural resources perspective as well as from broader public policy issues that are there.

One particular success story that needs to be highlighted is the programs that have been put in place over recent years to eradicate goats and deer on the island. These are programs that the state government, I think together with the federal government, has put money into in order to deal with what was a growing problem of goats and deer across the island. We were briefed on this by the people who have been conducting the eradication, and it has been tremendously successful.

Mr Pengilly: They are good shots.

Mr PICTON: Very good shots, as the member for Finniss says. I think that the positions that they hold in terms of those deer and goat hunting positions are probably quite prized. There are probably a lot of people in South Australia who would see themselves as being finely attuned for that position. I was particularly interested in the way that they tackled the goat problem on Kangaroo Island, which is to use a Judas goat. They find a goat from the mainland, particularly a white goat usually, which enables them to be easily spotted, and attach to them a radio collar that enables them to be tracked, and send them out to mate—or to almost mate—with the other goats on the island. They are, of course, desexed goats that they send in, but the males are very attracted to the desexed female Judas goats from the city.

It enables the staff from the environment department to track down the places that the goats are inhabiting, which can be in some very remote parts of the island, with their surefootedness over rocky terrain and cliff faces, places where they could not otherwise be tracked down. That has been very successful for the goat problem. Unfortunately, it has not worked as well for other animals, particularly deer. Deer are much smarter. They have tried the Judas technique with deer, with peacocks and with pigs, but it has really been just the goats that have fallen for the trick. It has been a massive effort in terms of deer hunting to try to track them down. I believe they think that they are now down to 60 or so deer on the island.

That is not to say that there are not other problems with other introduced species on the island, in particular pigs and cats, which are a massive problem. They are both more difficult to track, and a substantial investment will have to be made to try to eradicate those species across the island. I think—and I think the committee thought—that the money that has been invested so far has been well spent, and we would like to see the continuation of similar programs in the future to make sure that we can keep Kangaroo Island as free as possible from those introduced species.

There is also, of course, a huge number of foreign weeds across the island, and there are a number of programs that have been supported by the government to try to deal with them. We had a look at some of the weed sprayers and other equipment that is used to help farmers deal with weeds on their properties.

Of course, as the member for Finniss said, not all of the introduced species on Kangaroo Island are foreign and in Australia we would not necessarily think of all of them as introduced feral species. He mentioned marron, which are used in some of the aquaculture that we saw during the trip and, of course, platypuses, but always foremost in the mind of South Australians are the koalas on Kangaroo Island. The koala problem was not the focus of our trip, but it was certainly something that we looked at and something that we sought a briefing on when we were there.

There has been an ongoing program for a number of years to sterilise koalas on the island. In recent years, the number of koalas being sterilised has dropped, as the funding has been wound back slightly. I am happy to put myself forward as the person who suggested that maybe we need to look at whether an NGO could perhaps provide that service in the future rather than it being a government service. In the past it worked as a government service, given the numbers of sterilising operations that we were providing, but, now that the numbers have dropped, some of the economies of scale from the government's doing it are reducing.

Mr Pengilly: Sterilisation is done privately.

Mr PICTON: Okay, but we manage the program. I am suggesting that perhaps it should be managed privately by an NGO, and potentially they could get some efficiencies. I was interested in the evidence that we received. There is a huge number of people put their hand up to work in the government program to try and grab the koalas out of trees and bring them down. It is probably one of the most highly-sought jobs we have in the South Australian Public Service. It did strike me that perhaps an NGO might be able to even get volunteers to help do some of that work which would be more cost efficient.

In terms of vegetation there is an ongoing issue, and I think there are arguments on both sides in terms of roadside vegetation. Certainly, the council brought to our attention that it would like to clear a lot more of the roadside vegetation to enable safety for motorists, but also to make it easier for trucks to go along roads on Kangaroo Island. The confounding view is that roadside vegetation has some of the last remnant species we find of particular vegetation on Kangaroo Island and needs to be protected. Of course, there is a balance to be made there: we need to make sure that we protect our motorists, but we also need to make sure we protect some species that could otherwise be lost forever.

There are also issues—as the member for Finniss said—in terms of the blue gums on the island. I think the committee was thoroughly saddened by the situation in terms of the blue gums and the amount of land that could otherwise be used as prime farmland which is being taken up by these blue gums. There is very little hope on the horizon that there will be a good solution to this, particularly given the lack of an easy way to transport the gums off the island if they were to be felled in the future.

We also looked at some of the revegetation on the island. It was very impressive to see the work that has been put into revegetate large areas of land—sensitive to the original vegetation across the island—and it is very difficult to maintain that balance. It takes a lot of work and a lot of commitment by volunteers, but also the NRM board and the other people on the island, to make sure that is a success.

Very briefly, I would like to touch on some of the agriculture and aquaculture we saw on the island. I, in particular—but I am sure all the committee—was very impressed with the Heinrich's property that we saw and their use of kikuyu grass which, of course, is another introduced species to Kangaroo Island. They have been using it very well to run a more ecologically sustainable farm operation and they have rehabilitated a lot of land on their property, so a massive credit to them. Mr and Mrs Heinrich are very nice people and they were very hospitable to us on our visit.

We also saw a number of marron farms and saw the opportunities that aquaculture has on the island. That is going to feed into the work that we are undertaking in our forthcoming aquaculture inquiry.

Lastly, I would like to note that, as the member for Ashford said, we did hear a number of points raised in evidence about the disconnect between the council and various arms of the state government. I fundamentally believe that the commissioner will help in this regard, and I think most of the committee members did as well. I would also like to note how media savvy the Hon. Rob Brokenshire was by getting his face in the photo on the front page of The Islander, holding up their previous front page and noting the passage of the commissioner bill.

Mr Pengilly: Surprise, surprise.

Mr PICTON: Surprise, surprise.

The SPEAKER: Ah, an islander, I call the member for Bragg.

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (11:38): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise to speak on the report prepared for the parliament on the Kangaroo Island NRM region and disclose an interest, of course, of still being a landowner on Kangaroo Island, having been born and bred on the same.

The only disappointment, I would say, with this report is not in the exercise that was undertaken or, indeed, in the important projects that were observed and which have been referred to today, but that the number of recommendations that have come out of this are so narrow and so slim.

There are four, and I will address them briefly, but it seems to me that the committee has taken four of the cheap options to present to the minister for consideration because, clearly, there will be some funding connotations with these. I am disappointed that the big issues have not been dealt with but, nevertheless, at least the committee has been there and I thank them for doing so. I would hope that this report is one of the first to go onto the desk of the new commissioner for Kangaroo Island (if and when he or she is ever appointed), and that they march it up to the new minister for Kangaroo Island, whoever that is going to be, and that it is presented to cabinet for their support in the funding.

Let's consider No. 1: the subsidy for lime purchasing for acid soils. One would only have to look at the endless reports in the primary industries department to confirm that an enormous area on Kangaroo Island has trace element deficiencies and that there is an enormous need for support in that regard. Superphosphate has been used, of course, considerably over the last 70 or 80 years or so, significantly in the agricultural areas, and so I would have liked that to have been added in for some support in relation to the agricultural industry and not just the lime for the acid soils.

That is a problem and the salinity along creek lines in some areas of the island is also a problem, granted. However, the big picture here is the whole of the island has very significant deficiencies and I would urge the committee to inform themselves of what are truckloads of reports prepared on this issue over decades and understand that it is a much bigger issue to be dealt with.

The second recommendation is to look at having more signs on the side of the road about biosecurity. I do not know about any other members who have been to Kangaroo Island recently, but as you get off the boat, and off the plane into the airport for commercial travellers, you have big signs saying that you are not allowed to bring in bees, potatoes and a few other things. The biosecurity issue is still significant in that regard but, frankly, we need more than signs. We need much more than signs. I do not think you can have Alsatians, as they were previously named—German Shepherds—although I think the term Alsatian is still used. You cannot bring cats in unless they are actually—

Mr Pengilly: Sterilised.

Ms CHAPMAN: Sterilised. That information for anyone travelling to Kangaroo Island is very important to ensure that they do not interfere with the biosecurity protection, but you need a lot more than signs and pamphlets. Recommendation No. 3 is the management of feral deer, goats and peacocks. I heard the member for Kaurna eruditely present his understanding of how they are managing feral goats and using the Judas system. I went all the way to the Galapagos to find that they had eradicated over 100,000 goats in less than eight months using the Judas system, which did not come out from the Galapagos in the end; it turned out that this process came from New Zealand.

I want to tell you what is actually happening over there. Yes, there are a number of people dealing with this issue. Some are shooting them from helicopters, some are actually going out on the ground, and Mr Markopoulos and others who are attending to this project are going along the coast and eradicating groups. They are looking for the white ones—and here comes confession time. We used to own white ones and we let them go years ago, because what used to happen after World War II apparently was that people had goats for milk purposes. They were a cheap option. They were purebreds and they were brought to the island and used for milking. I probably milked them as a child—well, I know, I have been photographed milking them. They were let go, so if you find some white ones, the general rule is you do not shoot them because they are somewhat protected locally.

Nevertheless, there has been an exercise in dealing with the goat eradication. Personally, I do not think their current population is actually a problem. So, again, I do not think you have gone to the pointy end of the pencil. I think the real issue here is not the eradication of goats or keeping them at a managed level, which I think Mr Markopoulos and others are doing fine. Aside from dealing with the few peacocks that might still be along the south road or the feral deer which have not been a huge problem on Kangaroo Island, people need to get with the program and understand that, apart from other introduced species such as domestic pigs that have gone wild, there is a huge abundant native species issue over there. I am referring not only to koalas but also the New Zealand fur seals which have infiltrated the Kangaroo Island oceans and which, I have no doubt, have demolished the penguin population down to about zero.

These are the sort of issues that have to be dealt with, and the committee has an important role to go out there and understand what is happening and come back here with some recommendations, as hard and expensive as they might be for a government to pick up, that deal with the real issues rather tiptoeing around and cherrypicking the cheap options. That is all I would like to say about No. 3: get with the program. I do not want to even start on corellas and other abundant native species problems we have.

Mr Pengilly: Wallabies.

Ms CHAPMAN: Wallabies.

The Hon. T.R. Kenyon interjecting:

Ms CHAPMAN: We have an absurd situation—take up this with the local minister, for example—

The SPEAKER: The member for Newland will only interject when seated.

Ms CHAPMAN: —where landowners have to get permits for the culling of wallabies. Has there been any abuse of this process? Have we seen a situation where landowners have undertaken a wholesale slaughter of wallabies? No! But we have a situation where every landowner, every decent person looking after the environment, has to get a permit every year and pay a fee. What a joke! Talk about red tape! Start there!

Recommendation No. 4 is the environment stewardship scheme based on that proposed by KI farmers. That sounds good, and it would behove the committee to look at what projects the Department of Primary Industries has provided in the past. If they are not providing these at present, I would be surprised. If they are not, then some discussions ought to be presented to the minister for primary industry, because that is an issue which I think he should be taking up. He is listening intently to this debate, and has an opportunity to do it. If they are serious about protecting the environment, understand the big picture; do not cherrypick the cheap options. Go back and look at what other departments have done in a sensible and responsible way, and give them support to make sure it still happens.

Mr TRELOAR (Flinders) (11:46): I rise today to make a contribution and comment on the 100th report of the Natural Resources Committee of this parliament, of which I am very pleased to be a member. The report describes our fact-finding visit to Kangaroo Island late last year, 2014. I was very pleased to visit the island as part of this committee. It is some years since I have visited the island, so I was pleased to have that opportunity.

Flying in, as you do, to Kingscote and looking across the landscape I could not help but be impressed once again, first, at the way in which the island has been intelligently cleared and brought into production. There are quite large areas of remnant vegetation, particularly along creek lines and poorer soils, and the better areas, the more productive soils, have been brought into production by farmers. Kangaroo Island was one of the first settled areas of South Australia and continues to be—

Ms Chapman: The first.

Mr TRELOAR: The first, in fact: thank you, member for Bragg. The first, as she would know. I thank the committee Chair, the member for Ashford, for again capably leading the committee through its tour and deliberations, and also the member for Finniss who met us there at that time. As has already been mentioned, it was a difficult time for his family because he was in the process of burying his dear mother, so I thank him for the time he took out from that. I also thank the staff, Patrick Dupont and David Trebilcock. This report was one of David's last hurrahs, I think. I thank them both for their work in that.

It is interesting for me to note the similarities between Kangaroo Island and the southern end at least of my electorate of Flinders. Much of the landscape was very recognisable for me: those lateritic acidic soils, the sugar gums and the saline creek lines all brought images of home back to me. I can relate very much to the landscape we were walking through and looking at.

The committee has come up with quite a long report—a 70 page report—also with an executive summary and, as has been mentioned, four recommendations. It is interesting that the dot points in the executive summary include mention of—I will not say 'conflict'—difficult impasses sometimes between the Kangaroo Island Council and DEWNR. To be fair, a lot of these are around the management of the native vegetation, particularly roadside vegetation.

The issue here, of course, is that it is very difficult for councils, who have to manage the roadways and make them safe on behalf of their ratepayers, to obtain clearance to make anything like a safe passage along some of the major roads on Kangaroo Island. In a high rainfall environment, trees grow bigger and their foliage extends further out over the road. Really, there must be some common sense in this debate and there must be some practical resolve to get to the bottom of this issue. Councils must have the capacity to do reasonable clearance to make a road safe. Personally, I am of the opinion that a wide road is a safe road, not just for cars but for other traffic as well, particularly trucks and farm machinery. I hope that sensible discussion takes place about that.

We met with some of the local fishers; certainly it was very soon after the sanctuary zone legislation had been introduced, and they were still really quite worked up about that legislation and the impact it might have. We encouraged them to make a submission to the regional impact statement the government is undertaking at the moment, but many people in this house and beyond would understand that submissions do not necessarily count for a lot, particularly when legislation is already in place.

There is no doubt that these fishers will be in for a tough time because, even though only 6 per cent of the waters have been taken up in these sanctuary zones, for the most part it is a prime fishing zone and fishers ultimately will be fishing on top of each other in what is already a well-managed environment and a well-managed fishery.

New Zealand fur seals have been talked about already today, and I note that the member for Hammond maybe even two years ago had a private member's bill before this house to engage in the management of abundant native species. Certainly, two of the native species on Kangaroo Island would fall into that category—koala and New Zealand fur seals. Once again, I can make a comparison between Kangaroo Island and the bottom end of Eyre Peninsula, where I must say the New Zealand fur seals are having a significant impact on native fish stocks, the Wildcatch fishery, the farm tuna and probably the penguin colonies as well.

I think it is important, as the member for Bragg said, to have this conversation. We are in a significantly altered landscape. That is what we live in and that is what we produce from, so we can never not manage this landscape again, and that will mean managing abundant native species. I mention the wild animals that have gone feral—deer, goats and peacocks. I must commend those who were involved, and mostly they were from within the department but there were many private landowners as well (and I am sure the member for Finniss will vouch for this), in undertaking a significant effort to reduce their number.

I guess the ultimate aim is to eradicate them altogether, as I can only imagine what damage feral deer, goats and peacocks must do to the natural environment, particularly to the creek lines, which seem to be the most vulnerable and most susceptible to damage anyway and they are obviously where those feral deer, goats and peacocks congregate.

I was particularly pleased on the last day to visit the property of Andrew and Tracie Heinrich. Andrew and I knew each other many years ago when we were at boarding school together, and I had the opportunity to renew our friendship when he undertook a Nuffield scholarship back in 2006. I, of course, was a Nuffield scholar a few years earlier in 2002. I notice from the scholars' directory that Andrew undertook his study in how more efficient genetics can achieve improved carcass quality in sheep, which is really very much a production issue.

It was lovely to visit his property and see what can be done, because this property has been well farmed, obviously, but consideration has been given to the natural environment and enhancing that environment. No better example exists, I think, of how a productive and sustainable landscape can support a profitable and sustainable farm business. I think there are incredible lessons in that for all of us, so I congratulate Andrew and Tracie on there. He has planted kikuyu, as the member for Kaurna mentioned. This is an introduced pasture (as most of our pastures are, of course), and Andrew is managing this to sustain his production but also to stabilise his soils.

Much of the island is covered with acidic soils, and acidic soils tend to be limited in their productive capacity. One of the recommendations is that the government 'reinstate the subsidy to farmers to purchase lime to improve soil pH in areas with acid soils'. This may go beyond just Kangaroo Island. The Minister for Agriculture is here at the moment, and I have already had a brief conversation with him about this. It is one of the simplest and most cost-effective ways of raising soil pH and improving the production on that soil.

Acidic soils tend to become more acidic under modern farming practices, with the addition of fertilisers, artificial nitrogen and natural nitrogen being introduced into the soil profile. As they become more acidic, their productive capacity is limited. I think this really is worth considering because at the moment the amount of lime that is going out—the addition of lime—is certainly not meeting what we would expect the effort to be to maintain those soils at a neutral pH.

Lastly, at the Heinrich property we also met Andrew Gilfillan—a family name that would be well known in this place. He has been doing some work on a farm's environmental stewardship scheme. I think this has some merit. In essence, it provides the opportunity for landowners who have undertaken environmental works to be credited for that work, for it to be noted in their production or their product or as offsets, with regard to the Department of Environment, should they want to undertake any further work. With those few words, I commend the report to the house.

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (11:56): I rise to speak to the 100th report of the Natural Resources Committee, entitled Kangaroo Island Natural Resources Management Region Fact Finding Visit, 5-7 November 2014. I just want to make a few quick comments about bees and the fact that beekeepers do not have access to national parks like they used to. It is certainly a major concern in regard to beekeeping and agriculture in this state and in this country.

Bees are a vital part of our agricultural landscape, as they make sure there is pollination in cases where it is needed, whether it is with broadacre crops or in more horticultural-style crops, like almonds, which are planted in a broadacre fashion in some places. Certainly, in regard to canola and other crops, they are vital for pollination. The restrictions on going into national parks are really hurting the bee industry. This happens on Kangaroo Island and in Ngarkat Conservation Park as well. Before, beekeepers were actually custodians of the parks and maintained tracks and access, yet more and more I keep seeing and hearing about these beekeepers being given less and less access to keep up their vital work.

It is a vital time to access the flowers of the native bush in the season when they need to have their bees in the parks. They certainly do a great job in managing the parks and looking out for problems, as well as other issues around compliance in relation to the general public's access to parks. Kangaroo Island is well known for honey from its Ligurian bees, and that is why there is a strict quarantine protocol on bees going over to Kangaroo Island. All machinery has to be completely cleaned out for that process.

New Zealand fur seals are causing massive issues around the state, not just on Kangaroo Island, where they have decimated the little penguins, but certainly through the Coorong, where they are decimating fish catches for commercial fisheries. Something really needs to be done for people to get on board and manage those. We have heard about the effect of marine parks, which is really hurting fishers on Kangaroo Island, and also the issues around managing—

The SPEAKER: The member for Hammond may need to seek leave to continue his remarks.

Mr PEDERICK: I seek leave to continue my remarks, Mr Speaker.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

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