The Channel Country hosts some of the last remaining free-flowing desert rivers left on Earth.
They support cultural connections tens of thousands of years old, one of Australia’s largest clean green beef industries, and a budding tourism industry.
Cooper Creek Floodplains in August 2022. Photo: Kerry Trapnell.
Oil and gas is threatening to compromise the rivers that sustain this unique landscape, with devastating consequences for the wildlife and people that rely on it.
In 2015 the Palaszczuk Government pledged to protect the Lake Eyre Basin’s rivers and their Channel Country floodplains.
In December 2023, the Miles Government finally announce plans to protect the Channel Country rivers and floodplains. The new measures will protect Channel Country rivers and floodplains from:
- new oil and gas developments
- unconventional gas, and
- open cut mining.
The Miles Government plans to introduce these new protections in the next six months.
