Australian Government Provides Rp254 Billion In Funds To Save Koalas

JAKARTA - The Australian government has prepared a funding package of 18 million dollars or equivalent to Rp254 billion to protect the existence of koalas. Australia's endemic animals are threatened with extinction, even in their own habitat.

"The essential koala package will include funding for health research and medical support as well as restoration of key habitat sites through on-the-ground actions such as replanting, weed control, fencing, managed grazing and tailored fire planning and execution," said Australian Environment Minister Sussan Ley, quoted Yeni Safak, Wednesday, November 25.

Not only that, Ley also assured that the funds would later help each state, as well as the private sector, to carry out rescue efforts together. Moreover, scientists will also be heavily involved in this rescue effort.

"For all of our focus on koalas, scientists are telling us that there is a serious lack of data on where the real population is, how they are and how best to help them recover after the devastating wildfires," he said.

After that, all states will be required to report the koala population and its conservation plan annually. To support this, the government has also invested 2 million dollars to conduct research related to koala health. Especially, regarding how they can rise from diseases such as Chlamydia which is one of the main causes of koala deaths.

The rest, the government will help restore koala habitat affected by forest fires. As in koala habitat in northern New South Wales and South Queensland. However, Australia's Endangered Species Commissioner, Sally Box, said this step was quite late.

Moreover, these funds will be disbursed when koala habitat conditions are critical following forest fires. Even so, he is still optimistic that koalas can be saved.

"Today's announcement will support the conservation community to respond to the devastating 2019-2020 summer wildfire season impacting critical habitats for koalas and other threatened species across Australia," said Box.