Prepared by the Ecologically Sustainable Development Steering Committee
Endorsed by the Council of Australian Governments
December, 1992
ISBN 0 644 27253 8
Land Use Planning and Decision Making
Part 3 Intersectoral Issues - Chapter 13
Challenge
To ensure land use decision making processes and land use allocations at all levels of government meet the overall goal of ESD and are based on a consideration of all land values and uses, while avoiding fragmentation, duplication, conflict and unnecessary delays.
Strategic Approach
This can best be achieved through development of methods to enable land use planners and decision makers to place risk-weighted values on goods and services; further development of mechanisms to incorporate non-economic and economic considerations into decision making processes; adopting multiple and sequential land use planning management; and streamlining planning and decision making processes while ensuring effective public input.
Objective 13.1
- to encourage environmental and economic land use decision making which takes full account of all relevant land and resource values and to establish and operate systems of land use decision making and dispute resolution
Governments will:
- continue efforts to clarify, rationalise and publicise policies and legislation for access to land, including the nation's conservation estate and heritage estate
- at the State and Territory level, finalise current reviews of land use planning and decision making processes within their jurisdiction
- seek to adopt multiple and sequential land use planning management
- continue to develop cooperative and consultative arrangements between jurisdictions modelled on approaches taken in the Cape York Peninsula Land Use Strategy, the Murray-Darling Basin Commission, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority and the Australian Alps National Parks Memorandum of Understanding
- continue efforts to improve levels of understanding of Australia's natural resource base, and work towards land use planning and decision making processes which take those resource values into account
Objective 13.2
- to achieve clarity, certainty and accountability in the processes used to clarify access to land and to determine change of use
Governments will:
- ensure the agreements and mechanisms for cooperative action outlined under Schedule 2 of the IGAE are adhered to by all jurisdiction
- review Schedule 2 of the IGAE with a view to incorporating any relevant findings of the ESD process. In undertaking this review, further consideration will be given to:
- encouraging further consideration of the use of biophysical, geological, and ecological regions in decision making;
- examining options for improving terrestrial and marine area planning arrangements, including establishment of common principles for both terrestrial and marine areas; and
- working towards establishment of joint arrangements between Ministerial Councils to facilitate discussion of issues affecting land use planning and decision making
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