Peel Inlet and Harvey Estuary System Management Strategy ...

EPA Report on the Peel-Harvey Progress and Compliance Report, 2003
M16
M16-1
M17 and 17-1 16 April 1993
16 April 1993 Met. Compliance verified.
16 April 1993 Met. Compliance verified.
Partially met. A PCR was prepared but EPA
was not consulted as required by the
Condition.
7. THE LEGAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE FRAMEWORK FOR
MANAGEMENT AND THE PEEL-HARVEY
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION POLICY
The Expert Review Committee report provides a very competent analysis of the legal and
administrative framework for management by drawing on the work in the Specialist
report which forms Appendix 2 to the ERC report. A tiered management framework was
proposed in the EPA assessment consisting of:
• the management objectives for nutrients identified in the EPA assessment being set
in the Environmental Conditions
• an Environmental Protection Policy which includes those nutrient objectives as the
environmental objectives in the EPP; and
• development of a comprehensive integrated catchment management plan.
The EPA identified in its 1985 and 1988 assessments that the government would need to
develop an implementation mechanism for implementation of a catchment management
plan. The EPA notes that no such mechanism has yet been developed to enable
implementation of catchment management plans and the approach used to date for some
areas where diffuse source pollution is an issue (Peel-Harvey; Gnangara and Jandakot
groundwater mounds) of an EPP with an associated Statement of Planning Policy (SPP)
for land use control has largely not been successful.
The EPA notes that the lack of an appropriate mechanism to implement catchment
management plans is of great concern, given that detailed salinity and natural resource
management plans will increasingly be required to address the State’s major multiple
natural resource issues at a catchment scale. The EPA has recommended that such a
mechanism is required on two prior occasions (EPA, 1985 and 1988) and in this report is
also urging the government to address this issue.
The concept of the Environmental Protection Policy (EPP) for the Peel-Harvey coastal
catchment, gazetted on 11 December 1992, remains the appropriate instrument for the
EPA to set broad environmental quality objectives for the area as well as describing the
mechanism for achieving these objectives. The mechanism includes appropriate land
management by landholders and management authorities. The EPA supports the
establishment of the Peel-Harvey Catchment Council (in August 2000), which currently
is a sub-regional Council within the broader South West Catchment Council, but the
EPA is of the view that the initiative for the development of environmental values and
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