The Scientific Committee under the NSW Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995: seven years of debate
-
Published:2004
Chris R. Dickman, 2004. "The Scientific Committee under the NSW Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995: seven years of debate", Threatened species legislation: Is it just an Act?, Pat Hutchings, Daniel Lunney, Chris Dickman
Download citation file:
As specified by the NSW Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995, the Scientific Committee is responsible for listing threatened species, populations, ecological communities and key threatening processes in schedules of the Act, as well as for several review and advisory tasks. In this paper, I outline the composition, structure and functioning of the NSW Scientific Committee during its first seven years of operation (1996-2002), and then describe the Committee's approach in evaluating five nominations of different entities for listing. Each generated debate about different aspects of the listing process, the amount and quality of information required for the Scientific Committee to be able to make a determination, and about how criteria for listing different entities in the Act should be interpreted. From the debates, the Committee was able to develop robust and effective protocols for review of nominations and assessment of status. These protocols allowed the Scientific Committee to process some 600 nominations for listing and delisting of species, populations, communities and key threatening processes during its first seven years of operation, and should continue to assist the Committee to function in future.