For more than 180 million years, it has long been home to local communities. Now the Daintree, the planet’s oldest tropical rainforest, and one of Australia’s top attractions, will be returned to Aboriginal possessions and nursery. The eastern Kuku Yalangi people will manage this national park with the Queensland state government. The agreement, signed after four years of negotiations, sets an important precedent and includes other sites, including Cedar Bay, Black Mountain Islands and Hope Islands, with a total area of 160,000 hectares.
Biodiversity
Only indigenous peoples care about the forests
by Pietro Micarozzi
The government recognized – as stated in a memorandum from the Ministry of Environment – “the right of the eastern Koku Yalangi people to own their lands, protect their culture, one of the longest-lived in the world, and share it with visitors, thus controlling the tourism sector.”
the case
Rivers are like people, the right to exist
by Giacomo Talinani
On the borders of the Great Barrier Reef, Daintree was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1988, after campaigning against a deforestation plan approved by the administration at the time; It has been defined as “very important” to the biodiversity it hosts: three thousand species of plants, 107 of mammals, 368 of birds and 113 of reptiles. Not only. It is the largest area of the country where rainforests have managed to survive and preserve the remains of vegetation in Gondwana, the continent that at the beginning of the Paleozoic included the present southern hemisphere: from South America to Africa, from Australia to India, even Antarctica Southern.
green story
Indigenous wisdom to save the environment
by Rachel Cernansky
As consultant and moderator Chrissy Grant explains to the Australian edition of The Guardian, “People have always lived inside the forest. This is something unique on the UNESCO World Heritage List.” And in order to respect the principle of self-determination, but also to ensure that the precious ecosystem remained in the hands of those who had the most interest in protecting it, and that the forest – in fact – and wetlands everywhere were once again entrusted with the care of these indigenous peoples.
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