Publications

Appendix 7 - Geographic areas of responsibility

• National Parks, Marine Parks and Reserves
• Indigenous Protected Areas
• The National Reserve System
• Ramsar Sites
• Natural Heritage Trust Regions
• National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality Regions
• World Heritage Areas
• Register of the National Estate

National Parks, Marine Parks and Reserves

The Commonwealth terrestrial national parks and reserves are Uluru - Kata Tjuta National Park, Kakadu National Park, Booderee National Park (all jointly managed with the traditional owners), Christmas Island National Park, Norfolk Island National Park (including Norfolk Island Botanic Garden), Pulu Keeling National Park and the Australian National Botanic Gardens. The total area of these parks and gardens is 21 313 square kilometres.

National marine parks and reserves are Ashmore Reef, Coringa-Herald, Elizabeth and Middleton Reefs, Heard Island and McDonald Island, Lihou Reef, Mermaid Reef, Tasmanian Seamounts, Cartier Island, Macquarie Island and the Great Barrier Reef, and the Commonwealth waters of Ningaloo, Solitary Islands, Great Australian Bight and Lord Howe Island. The total area of the Commonwealth's marine parks and reserves is 616 572 square kilometres.

The Commonwealth also has 6 reserves in the Antarctic Region and 13 reserves surrounding historic shipwrecks off the Australian coastline.

The Antarctic Special Protection Areas are Marine Plain, Ardery and Odbert Islands, Clark Peninsula, North-east Bailey Peninsula, Rookery Islands and Taylor Rookery. The total area of these areas is 34.5 square kilometres.

The Historic Shipwrecks are Aarhus, Cato, Emden, Foam, HMS Pandora, HMS Porpoise, I-24 (Japanese submarine), SS Dunkenfeld, Yongala, Zuytdorp, Lady Darling, Gothenburg, Llewellyn and Clonmel. The total area of these reserves is 8.3 square kilometres.

Indigenous protected areas

Indigenous Protected Areas are declared by Indigenous landowners who are supported through the Natural Heritage Trust to manage their lands for the protection of natural and cultural features. Management is implemented in accordance with internationally recognised standards and guidelines for the benefit of all Australians.

The declaration of an Indigenous Protected Area over Indigenous owned lands results in that land being considered as part of the National Reserve System. There are currently 17 Indigenous Protected Areas making up a total area of over 13.7 million hectares. In 2002-03 Mt Willoughby (South Australia), covering 386 500 ha was declared. Also declared in 2002-03 was the largest Indigenous Protected Area, Ngaanyatjarra Lands (Western Australia), which covers almost 10 million hectares.

National Reserve System

The National Reserve System Program aims to assist with the establishment of a comprehensive, adequate and representative system of protected areas to conserve Australia's biodiversity. In 2002-03 the National Reserve System Program approved 43 properties for addition to the National Reserve System totaling 935 721 hectares.

Since the commencement of the program, properties added to the National Reserve System through purchase or covenant have increased the protected area estate in Australia by 6.78 million hectares. This represents 8.75% of the terrestrial reserve system.

Ramsar sites

Ramsar sites are wetlands that are designated under the Convention on Wetlands because they are internationally significant in terms of ecology, botany, zoology, limnology or hydrology. Australia has 64 Ramsar sites, occurring in all jurisdictions, including the Coorong and Coongie Lakes (SA), Corner Inlet (Vic), Macquarie Marshes (NSW), Moreton Bay (Qld), Roebuck Bay (WA) and Kakadu National Park (NT).

Natural Heritage Trust regions

There are 62 Natural Heritage Trust regions. These regions are:

New South Wales	South Australia	Western Australia	Queensland
Border Rivers Central Coast Central West Gwydir Hawkesbury-Nepean Hunter Lachlan Lower Murray-Darling Lower North Coast Mid North Coast Murray Murrumbidgee Namoi Northern Rivers South East Southern Sydney Harbour Sydney South Upper North Coast Western (NSW)	Aboriginal Lands Eyre Peninsula Kangaroo Island Mount Lofty Ranges Northern Yorke Agricultural District Rangelands River Murray South East	Northern Agriculture Region Swan Rangelands South Coast Region South West Region Avon	Burdekin Mackay-Whitsunday Fitzroy Burnett-Mary Desert Channels SEQ Western Catchments SEQ Murray-Darling Committee Wareego-Paroo/Bulloo Balonne-Maranoa Border Rivers Condamine
Victoria	Tasmania	Australian Capital Territory	Northern Territory
Corangamite East Gippsland Glenelg/Hopkins Goulburn Broken Mallee North Central North East Port Phillip West Gippsland Wimmera	North North West Midlands South	Australian Capital Territory	Northern Territory

National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality regions

The National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality targets 21 of the worst affected areas in Australia. These regions are:

New South Wales	South Australia	Western Australia	Queensland
Namoi-Gwydir Macquarie-Castlereagh Lachlan-Murrumbidgee Murray	Mt Lofty-Kangaroo Island-Northern Agricultural Districts South East Lower Murray (SA-Vic)	South Coast South West Northern Agricultural Region Avon Ord (WA-NT)	Burdekin-Fitzroy Lockyer-Burnett-Mary Border Rivers (NSW/Qld) Condamine-Balonne-Maranoa (NSW-Qld)
Victoria	Northern Territory	Tasmania
Goulburn-Broken Avoca-Loddon-Campaspe Glenelg-Hopkins-Corangamite	Darwin-Katherine	Midlands

World Heritage areas

Australia's World Heritage sites (with the date when they were first inscribed on the list) are:

• 1981 Great Barrier Reef, Kakadu National Park, Willandra Lakes Region
• 1982 Tasmanian Wilderness, Lord Howe Island Group
• 1987 Uluru - Kata Tjuta National Park, Central Eastern Rainforest Reserves
• 1988 Wet Tropics of Queensland
• 1991 Shark Bay, Western Australia
• 1992 Fraser Island
• 1994 Australian Fossil Mammal Sites (Riversleigh/Naracoorte)
• 1997 Heard and McDonald Islands, Macquarie Island
• 2000 Greater Blue Mountains Area

Register of the National Estate

The Register of the National Estate is Australia's national inventory of natural and cultural heritage places. It is compiled by the Australian Heritage Commission.

There are now more than 13 000 natural, historic and Indigenous places in the register. They are in all parts of Australia and are owned variously by Commonwealth, state and local governments, by businesses, voluntary and other organisations and by private individuals.

All places entered in the register are assessed against publicly available criteria outlining national estate values.