Biodiversity Decline

Legislation and policy

• Development planning and regulation has specific components addressing biodiversity, for example, State Planning Policies (SPPs) – SPP 4: Biodiversity (2019), urban tree canopy overlay/offset scheme (2021) and the Regulated and Significant Tree Overlay in the Planning and Design Code.
• The South Australian Government is currently developing a Biodiversity Act to protect and conserve biodiversity in South Australia.

Reports, plans and strategies

• Landscape SA developed regional 5-year landscape plans for all South Australian regions (2020–21), including identifying priorities for reversing biodiversity decline, and have been implementing these plans through a variety of programs, projects and activities since then.
• The Department for Environment and Water released the Nature Conservation Directions Statement (2020) and has managed biodiversity programs that include the SA Parks network, Native Vegetation Heritage Agreements, environmental water provisions of the Murray–Darling Basin Plan (see River Murray section), the SA Habitat and Wildlife Bushfire Recovery Framework, the Kangaroo Island Bushfire Recovery, the Dynamic Fire and Biodiversity Tool, and the National Environment Science Program Threatened Species Recovery Hub.
• The 2023 DEW trend and condition report cards had a renewed focus on further understanding biodiversity decline and data gaps by incorporating new biodiversity themes and indicators.

Projects and activities

• Over the next 4 years, the South Australian Government will be developing a new database, Biodata SA,to improve the capture and management of biodiversity data in South Australia. BioData SA will also improve access to quality data to inform evidence-based decision making in areas such as mining, planning, development approvals, emergency response, biodiversity management and climate change.

Coastal Protection

Legislation and policy

• State Planning Policies, under South Australia’s Planning and Design Code, include SPP 13: Coastal Environment (2019), with coastal area policies generally reflected through the application of the Coastal Area Overlay.
• The administration of the Coast Protection Act 1972 by the Coastal Protection Board has addressed a range of coastal protection issues.

Reports, plans and strategies

• DIT’s climate change adaptation guideline includes consideration of sea-level rise and management of coastal assets.

Projects and activities

• DEW’s Adelaide beach management activities and its coastal management work, including land surface elevation mapping of the South Australian coastline to enable the assessment of risks of rising sea level, have been, and are, addressing coastal protection in a changing climate.

Waste Management

Challenges in implementing this recommendation included:

• an increase in waste generation resulting from natural disasters and COVID-19
• ongoing challenges with insecure end-markets for secondary raw materials (first with international end-market closures arising from China Sword and then slow development of onshore markets)
• costs (eg a 40% increase in the Solid Waste Levy)
• pursuing non-mandatory product stewardship schemes allowing the continuation of various complex materials entering our waste/recycling streams, and recycling industry challenges (eg the Visy MRF fire and the collapse of REDCycle).

Legislation and policy

• 2019 – The EPA has completed a review of South Australia’s iconic Container Deposit Scheme (CDS), which showed the state can increase the recovery and recycling of beverage containers to boost the local remanufacturing industry and maintain South Australia’s leadership. The EPA continued to lead work nationally on expanding the scope of eligible containers, and led the development of a behavioural study to understand what drives consumers to participate in CDSs across jurisdictions.
• 2020 – The development and implementation of the Recycling and Waste Reduction Act 2020 has provided a framework progressively introducing export bans for a range of ‘waste’ materials.
• The EPA’s mass balance reporting requirements, introduced by the EPA via the Environment Protection (Mass Balance Reporting and Other Measures) Variation Regulations 2020 have addressed the accountability and waste levy aspects of the waste management industry.
• 2020 – South Australia passed the Single-use and Other Plastic Products (Waste Avoidance) Act 2020, being the first of its kind in Australia, progressively introducing single-use plastics bans and administered by GISA.

Reports, plans and strategies

• 2019 – Disaster Waste Management Capability Plan and its accompanying guidelines were developed and embedded into the South Australian State Emergency Management Plan. This was the first of its kind in Australia. GISA was appointed as Disaster Waste Management Functional Lead and carried out this function after the 2019–20 bushfires and is doing so following the recent River Murray floods.
• South Australia’s Waste Strategy 2020-25 – released in 2020 as a major step in the transition to a circular economy, achieving environmental gains while boosting the South Australian economy, followed by South Australia’s first Food Waste Strategy: Valuing Our Food Waste 2020–2025, which is a strategy to reduce and divert household and business food waste. Both strategies are administered by GISA.
• 2022 – GISA worked with Regional Development Australia in the Limestone Coast and Murraylands and Riverland to develop two ‘Circular Economy Opportunities’ reports for these regions. These reports outline the economic development opportunities for the regions to maximise and retain value locally, and increase resilience and business sustainability, while building on their natural environmental capital.
• GISA represents the South Australian Government in a national reference group to coordinate and report on the South Australian implementation of the National Waste Policy Action Plan.

Projects and activities

• 2017 – GISA has provided more than $75 million in project funding to build and improve waste, recycling and resource recovery equipment and infrastructure, supporting innovation, resource efficiency and circular economy transition, via its Recycling Infrastructure Grants, Circular Economy Market Development Grants and Business Sustainability Program.
• SA Water’s Recycling and reuse and Proactive Environmental Leadership have sought to address waste management through recycling, with challenges including perceptions that recycled materials are inferior to new materials and the cost of recycled products.
• The waste and recycling industry has continued to develop its waste management approaches, for example, through infrastructure projects, including transfer station upgrades, new materials recovery facility construction, upgrades to existing facilities, and biogas capture and storage.
• The EPA has completed a substantial waste reform program aimed at establishing a robust regulatory environment to support the sustainable operation of the waste and resource recovery industry. This has included new regulatory measures to address stockpiling of waste, development of a position statement on thermal energy from waste activities, introduction of monthly reporting requirements for waste facilities and amendments to how the waste levy is collected from landfills.
• The Local Government Association of South Australia (LGA) has addressed waste and recycling through its Circular Procurement Pilot Project and updates of waste-related templates, documents and resources.

Aquatic Ecosystem Resilience

Legislation and policy

• 2019 – The release of State Planning Policy SPP 14: Water Security and Quality addressed water quality aspects, supporting aquatic ecosystem resilience.

Reports, plans and strategies

• SA Water has advocated for source water protection as part of its Environment Policy, and has faced challenges such as demand for, cost of and willingness to pay for wastewater treatment plant upgrades and recycled water infrastructure, and the need to understand the most efficient investment to protect aquatic ecosystems (for example, investment in urban and agricultural runoff versus point source pollution).

Projects and activities

• DEW’s Water management activities, including the Flows for the Future program in the eastern Mt Lofty Ranges, as well as River Murray, Coorong and Lower Lakes initiatives have been the key contributions to South Australian efforts to address aquatic ecosystem resilience.
• Landscape SA (LSA) have been carrying out programs that contribute to aquatic ecosystem resilience, including allocating water for the environment via water allocation plans, protecting groundwater dependent ecosystems via the Far North Wells and Adelaide Plains water allocation plans, and land and water management activities across the state (see LSA websites).
• Agricultural sustainability programs and land use practices have reduced pressures on aquatic ecosystems by: continuing to address soil erosion risks via minimum/no tillage and stubble retention, reducing the risk of chemical and nutrient runoff via precision agriculture, avoiding spray drift into watercourses through careful weather-informed timing of chemical‑label-compliant spraying, including watercourse protection in their farm management plans and, in some cases, by the adoption of regenerative principles into their farming systems.
• Non-government organisations such as Water Sensitive SA have promoted and facilitated water sensitive urban design (WSUD), which enhances aquatic ecological health by improving stormwater quality before it reaches a ‘natural’ watercourse.
• The EPA’s Aquatic Ecosystem Condition Reports have reported on aquatic ecosystem condition annually, and the EPA’s regulatory activities aim to protect water quality from pollution via the administration of the Environment Protection Act 1993 and the Environment Protection (Water Quality) Policy 2015, licensing of industries, investigation and compliance work and by providing direction or advice on development planning proposals.

Environmental Information

Legislation and policy

Nothing reported

Reports, plans and strategies

• DEW updated the themes used in the 2020 environmental trend and condition report cards, with a greater focus on biodiversity and ‘Liveability’ as a new theme in 2023, along with a rigorous and transparent environmental information and data management approach (Managing Environmental Knowledge).
• Landscape SA developed 5-year landscape plans based on environmental information. They have undertaken program and project-specific monitoring and evaluation as outlined in their monitoring, evaluation, reporting and improvement plans, for example, LSA Murraylands and Riverland, as well as using DEW trend and condition report cards. Resourcing continues to limit monitoring, in many regions, to a focus on specifically measuring the outcomes of externally funded programs.
• PIRSA produced the ZONING IN: South Australian Aquaculture report 2022, which is a summary of aquaculture activity, regulation and environmental monitoring, and the final report on the regional Environmental Monitoring Program for the Lower Spencer Gulf will be available in December 2023.

Projects and activities

The EPA commissioned an independent review of the 2018 SOER process. The EPA provided responses to the 14 recommendations from the review and several of them have been implemented as part of the 2023 SOER, for example, an enhanced stakeholder engagement process, promoting knowledge to facilitate adoption, discussing the impact from previous SOER recommendations and incorporating more regionally relevant information.