New Action Plan for Australian Birds

Birds Australia, Charles Darwin University and CSIRO Publishing today launched The Action Plan for Australian Birds 2010. The Action Plan is the third in a series that have been produced at the start of each decade. It analyses the status of all the species and subspecies of Australia's birds to determine their risk of extinction.

“At one level this book describes a tragedy,” said Dr Graeme Hamilton, CEO of Birds Australia, “That in the 200 short years since Europeans arrived in Australia we have so diminished our natural capital that 234 Australian birds are either Extinct, threatened with extinction or Near Threatened, is a national disgrace”.

But this is not a book of lost causes. It is a call for action to keep the extraordinary biodiversity we have inherited and pass the legacy to our children. Every one of Australia's threatened birds can be saved.

“We do not need to lose any more Australian birds,” said Barry Baker, President of Birds Australia. “This book describes the populations of species at greatest risk and outlines ways we can turn them around.”

There is much reason to hope. We would have lost far more had there not been enormous effort over the last few decades. After

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