November 15, 2011
The rehabilitation of the Heart Morass by a vast array of community organisations has been commended in Federal Parliament.
The Nationals Member for Gippsland Darren Chester raised the project which has seen degraded farmland on the shores of the Latrobe River near the mouth of Lake Wellington rehabilitated to become a thriving wetland.
The project is a combined effort between the WET Trust, Field and Game Australia, BugBlitz program, the Hugh DT Williamson Foundation, Watermark and West Gippsland Catchment Management Authority (WGCMA).
Mr Chester told Parliament that the rehabilitation of the Heart Morass would benefit the entire community and help to restore the Gippsland Lakes.
“This is a great example of a wetland project that has rehabilitated land that was very marginal at best and that is being actively managed,” Mr Chester told Parliament.
“The community is really engaged in the project and understands how viable and vibrant a wetland can be.
“To really value a wetland like this you need to give people the opportunity to get out there and enjoy it, to walk in it, you should not just lock it up and leave it.”
Mr Chester said the project was also a model of community partnerships and practical environmental work.
“The partners in the project have come from quite diverse backgrounds, which reflects the opportunity for multiple use of environmental assets,” Mr Chester said.
“The WET Trust and the Williamson Foundation contributed the bulk of the $1.1 million used to purchase private land in 2006, which was the first stage of the restoration project.
“The Williamson Foundation, with its Bug Blitz program, has been involved with bringing hundreds of school children together to learn in an outdoor classroom, to get a better appreciation of wetlands.
“There are hunters who are very interested in a sustainable and conservation based approach to the wetlands. They are very committed environmentalists in their own right and they obviously have a vested interest in ensuring that their sport has a future for future generations.
“There are bird watchers and bushwalkers who are interested in enjoying those natural environs and appreciating the great natural beauty of the Latrobe River and the wetland area as it meanders its way down towards the Gippsland Lakes.
“There are also the natural resource managers, the West Gippsland CMA, who see real value in the capacity of the wetland to strip away some of the nutrients that would otherwise have ended up in the Gippsland Lakes system and be a source of future algal blooms.
“It is a project of national significance which is happening at a very local scale and has great potential to be expanded to other parts of our region.”