Wildlife advocates and environmental expert have their say on damning State of the Environment report

The State of the Environment report, a five yearly document used to asses the health of Australia's natural ecosystems in a broad range of contexts found, most shockingly, Australia's environment is in a poor and deteriorating state due to a culmination of threats.

It lists impacts from climate change, habitat loss, invasive species, pollution and resource extraction as key dangers but experts in the area like Federation University vegetation ecologist Dr Nicholas Schultz said there is a possibility to "turn things around."

"I think that people need to realise that this is not just a report about natural environments but this has real ramifications for the way we live in Australia," Dr Schultz said.

While he said he was not surprised by the report he did find it disappointing.

However, he said there were opportunities to undo the damage the report revealed including the more than eight million hectares of native vegetation being burned, including nine per cent of the nation's koala habitat during the Black Summer Bushfires in 2019-2020.

"We need strong leadership and governance, but we can also take matters into our own hands as individuals as well," Dr Schultz said.

"A lot of us have pretty good knowledge of things we can do that might make a difference, but we just need to value those things higher and take a bit of pride in doing them."

Two groups Dr Schultz suggested people in Ballarat could join immediately to minimise environmental destruction are the Ballarat Environment Network and the Buninyong Landscape Alliance.

"I think that there's a whole raft of things from, from little things to big things, people can do to improve the state of our environment including staying up to date with local initiatives and getting involved," he said.

Dr Schultz said Ballarat's score in the 'walking' category of the report, which found only Ballarat Central, Lake Wendouree and Soldiers Hill to be 'most walkable', was another area which also needed to be addressed to improve Ballarat's environmental outcomes.

"Ballarat got a 41 out of 100 in the 'walkability' category which is pretty low and we're classified as car dependent even though a very high proportion of Ballarat's population live and work within Ballarat," he said.

"It just seems to me like there's some really clear ways that Ballarat could aspire to improve their environmental impact through better managing our urban areas."

The report also highlighted the dire conditions existing animals were in with an eight per cent rise in species either being newly listed or up-listed to a higher category of threat since 2016.

Wildlife Victoria rescuer Jessica Robertson, who is a key stakeholder opposing the felling of a Gordon blue gum plantation where four koalas live, said she did not find the report "terribly surprising".

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"As a wildlife rescuer and carer we've known that our wildlife have been suffering for a long time," Ms Robertson said.

"No one really wants to know that from us, and no one asks us, even though we're on the front line, we see it every day, we witness firsthand the suffering and the trauma that comes from these environmental threats with the big one being habitat loss."

Among these startling findings, Ms Robertson said she was able to attest the statistic which found 70 per cent of threatened ecological communities were unmonitored.

"We know first hand that this is true because if for example the koala species were monitored in Victoria, our koala population would have been labelled as endangered many years ago," she said.

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Ms Robertson said more urgent action by the government was required in order to ensure secure koala population in Victoria, particularly western Victoria.

"Unless the government does something very quickly to save Victorian koalas, they'll go from having no listing to becoming critically endangered overnight," she said.

"Environmental laws need to be really strengthened and federal laws need to be applied across the board because without the environment, we have no economy and without the environment, we have no quality of life."

Wombat Forestcare convenor Gayle Osborne said she found the report as a reassurance of what wildlife advocates like herself had witnessed for some time.

"Biodiversity is declining at an alarming rate and it's reassuring to see this in the report. I only hope this will force some immediate action such as halting native forest logging," Ms Osborne said.

"I also hope in light of what's been reported that we legislate the Wombat-Lerderderg National Park as quickly as possible to protect the threatened species that live there because the Wombat State Forest is a critical habitat for many species that are threatened with extinction including the great gliders."

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Ms Osborne said more stringent deforestation laws needed to be put in place by the government.

"We need overarching national laws and there should be no exemptions for deforestation laws," she said.

Similarly, Dr Schultz said clearer framework and a more "serious" approach to Australia's environmental crisis was sorely needed to reverse the damage already done to Australia's ecosystems.

"Each level of government needs to take their own responsibility seriously because I don't think we're going to get away from the fact that that the local government can influence the local environment and state governments can influence the way the environment is managed," he said.

However, while the report recommended more comprehensive laws surrounding environmental policies, he said stagnancy was not a solution either.

"We shouldn't be sitting around and waiting for a better framework either. Everybody needs to recognise that they can immediately do things that are going to have positive outcomes," Dr Schultz said.

"Federal government needs to show the strongest leadership here but each level of government needs to take their responsibilities very seriously as well, and that includes the Victorian state government."

To read the report, which was written by 37 expert authors, click here.

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