207 Years - The Australian Environment

INTRODUCTION

"In the last one hundred years man has reshaped the earth more than he did in all the preceding generations, and today he changes land, sea and sky more rapidly and radically than he ever did in the past. The sheer scale of our present impact on the environment confronts us ..."1
Indeed it does! And here in Australia no less than elsewhere. In fact David Attenborough estimates that eighty percent of Australia has been damaged since white settlement.2
What have been the actions and ideologies behind the environmental impacts? What have the impacts been? Can the Australian environment continue to sustain the impacts? In answering the first question Aboriginal and white environmental ideologies are discussed; to illustrate the different land management approaches; to provide a baseline for the state of the environment before settlement; and to understand why the settlers interacted with the Australian environment as they did. The various impacts made upon the enviro...