In 2002, the future of the Cape York Peninsular wilderness will once again come to public prominence. Over the past six months, a number of important developments have occurred in the campaign to protect this extraordinary place. This Wilderness Society Cape York Campaign bulletin provides an indepth update of significant events.

In this bulletin

A Progress Report ...on the implementation of the Cape York Heads of Agreement   Shelburne update ... the campaign to protect the white sand country of Shelburne Bay

The findings of a major new conservation study of the environmental significance of Cape York Peninsula... The Statement of Natural Heritage Significance New threats to wilderness ...cotton, cane and land clearing Developing a Sustainable tourism industry

How to get involved

Related links

The Wilderness Society

 

© The Wilderness Society

E-mail - cape.york@wilderness.org.au

E-bulletin by Lyndon Schneiders & Anthony Esposito

Cape York...

"Here, still, are most features of the high rainfall belt of east coast Australia which elsewhere have been annihilated or destroyed.

It represents our last chance to hold and protect the heritage of that part of the continent in unfragmented extent.

The vastness of Cape York should not destroy our perspective. Beyond it is nothing - it is a residue of the wave of development which has submerged the rest of the east coast of Australia.

Here, rainforest, heath, swamp, plain, stream, forest, dune, and coastline, weave and mesh in a complex whole, ecotones intact and the full complexity of primeval Australia still apparent."

Peter Stanton,
address to the World Wilderness Congress, Cairns 1980

Images courtesy of
~ Steve Nowakowski
~ Kerry Trapnell
~ Geoff Spanner
~ Paul Zborowski