River Murray Coorong Corridor

The River Murray Forest

The River Murray Forest (RMF) project is a large-scale habitat establishment and biosequestration initiative. The project aims to establish an additional 2.5 million trees in the River Murray corridor and northern Murray Mallee environments of South Australia, and in doing so provide long-term biodiversity benefits, carbon sequestration benefits and diversification potential.

The River Murray Forest is entirely within the River Murray - Coorong NatureLinks Corridor. NatureLinks principles will be used in determining priorities for restoration as part of the River Murray Forest project.

Establishment of the forest will involve plantings on both public and private land within a broad corridor, approximately 20 km either side of the River Murray, initially from the SA/Vic border to Morgan.

The innovative new project provides a strategic approach to landscape revegetation with multiple benefits to the environment including re-connecting patches of valuable ecosystems, working to offset greenhouse emissions, promoting the establishment of sustainable new industries and assisting in reducing erosion of topsoils.

Investment in the forest will be sought from the community, private landholders, business and industry on a "two for one" basis (ie One-third of the funding for the River Murray Forest will be from private investment).

Plantings will be made up of regionally native perennial species appropriate to the vegetation communities at the location. The plantings will be established on cleared areas that were formerly forested. This not only forms part of the fundamental objective of re-establishing habitat for native species in the region, but is important when considering carbon sequestration, as the agreed rules for the establishment of a 'forest sink' or 'carbon sink' require the vegetation to be planted on land that was cleared prior to 1990.

Whether revegetating for biodiversity, land management or carbon sequestration motives, it's a long-term commitment. The project will ensure the protection of the vegetation established through the development of long-term agreements, registered on the land title.

The River Murray Forest project is different from traditional revegetation initiatives in a couple of ways. By formally including carbon sequestration - a basis of carbon trading - the project is linking biodiversity and carbon outcomes into every planting established. The vegetation will accumulate carbon that may have a value as an 'offset', or for trading purposes. This introduces a potential commercial value to revegetation beyond the implied land management or biodiversity benefits.

Further, the project is adopting a true market approach, by indicating the outcomes sought and inviting the market to submit proposals to deliver the revegetation plantings on private land. The project is open to all to participate, including landholders, revegetation providers, community groups and volunteer organisations, participants in the carbon market, investors and any other individuals or organisations that are interested. Stage 1 tendering commenced June 2007.

The River Murray Forest project is a multi-agency collaboration between the Departments for Environment and Heritage and Water Land and Biodiversity Conservation as the lead agencies. Further information on the context, contact details and fact sheets are available from http://www.dwlbc.sa.gov.au/murray/projects/rmf/index.html