Firm says it is now re-adjusting to a realistic end date and blames difficulties in procuring new planes and sustainable jet fuel
Air New Zealand has become the first major airline to drop its 2030 goal to cut carbon emissions.
The company has blamed difficulties in procuring new planes and sustainable jet fuel.
The federal government is reviewing a US-backed company’s fracking proposal in the Kimberley, sparking environmental and cultural concerns.
China’s southern Hunan province has suffered several days of heavy rain and flooding as remnants of the now-weakened Typhoon Gaemi continue to lash the country.
Climate change has killed billions of corals and fundamentally changed coral reefs. The response, especially in Australia, has been to fix the symptoms, not address the cause – climate change for which humans are responsible.
Much money and research effort is expended in replacing, regrowing and supporting corals, in the hope reefs may survive a warmer world.
These technological and scientific “solutions” give hope that something can be done. But as we argue in Nature Climate Change today, there is little evidence these measures will create resilient or healthy reef ecosystems over the long term.
Humanity must take dramatic action on climate change. By focusing so much attention on treating the symptoms – such as replacing dead corals – we risk squandering money, time and public trust in science.
We believe coral restoration may be, at best, a feel-good measure that satisfies a human urge to do something about climate change – and at worst, a dangerous distraction from climate action. A fundamental rethink is needed.
The world’s coral reefs have suffered devastating damage due to climate change and resulting warmer seas. This includes the Great Barrier Reef, which last summer experienced yet another mass bleaching.
Clearly, something must be done.
In recent years, a popular solution has emerged in the form of direct scientific interventions. These include:
growing baby corals in a nursery to later plant them on an ocean reef
selective breeding, which involves identifying heat-tolerant corals, collecting their eggs and sperm, and breeding heat-tolerant offspring
minimising stressors, for example, cloud-seeding or building structures to shade coral, pumping cooler water onto reefs or removing natural predators such as crown-of-thorns starfish.
Such interventions attract substantial research and philanthropic funding. But many scientists, including us, are concerned about their growing popularity.
There is little compelling evidence these interventions improve outcomes across coral reef ecosystems.
For example, a 2020 study synthesised current knowledge in coral reef restoration. It found 60% of projects had monitored restored sites for less than 18 months. Most projects were small-scale, with a median restored area of 100 square metres.
It concluded coral restoration projects were poorly designed, lacked clear and achievable objectives, and improvements were needed in monitoring and reporting.
Another study last year found some forms of coral rehabilitation “may be feasible, affordable, and ethical”, but the benefits were small and the measures expensive.
The researchers said legislation and policy should concentrate on “bolstering ecosystem resilience by reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other drivers of reef degradation”.
In some areas of science, such as human health, people have been shown to prefer solutions that involve active intervention: that is, adding something new, regardless of evidence for or against its efficacy. The same “intervention bias” may be influencing how we try to help coral reefs.
A vast literature on coral reefs calls for action in the form of scientific intervention.
However, resilience, recovery and change are an inherent feature of natural ecosystems. This was demonstrated by a review of 400 studies of disturbed ecosystems, which showed human restoration provided no consistent benefits over natural recovery.
Recent evidence from the northern Great Barrier Reef, following a major bleaching event, supports the idea that, in the short-term at least, nature can recover on its own. There, coral cover jumped from 10% in 2016, the lowest ever recorded, to an ephemeral but record high of 36% just six years later.
This is not to say the bounce-back will last. Heatwaves will continue to kill regrown corals, rendering this natural success temporary. That’s why drastic emissions reduction is essential.
Intervention on coral reefs usually aims to increase live coral cover. This approach rests on the assumption that more coral leads to healthy reefs.
Corals are undoubtedly a foundational and iconic part of coral reefs. But corals and reefs are not the same. Corals are important, iconic organisms. Coral reefs are highly diverse, complex ecological systems composed of thousands of animal, plant and bacteria species.
The science is not clear on whether more corals will return reefs to a “healthy” state, especially given such scientific interventions are usually small in scale. There is also evidence suggesting reefs can grow, even when coral species decline.
More science is needed to determine what a “healthy” reef is. A pretty reef with plenty of coral? A usable reef with plenty of fish? Or a reef that is unspoiled by human activity?
And there’s another important research question to answer: how can humanity come to terms with reefs transformed by climate change?
We do not seek to divide reef scientists into camps “for and against” coral restoration.
But we are not confident that specific, targeted coral interventions will have wider benefits. What’s needed is broader, evidence-based investigation into transformation across reefs and human communities – to bring about real, large-scale solutions.
We realise our position may be considered controversial. But the stakes are high – and an evidence-based approach to caring for coral reefs is urgently needed.
David Roy Bellwood receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
Tiffany Morrison receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
Robert Paul Streit does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Australia was once the world’s largest exporter of live animals. But exports have declined in recent years.
In May, the federal government announced live export of sheep by sea would end on May 1 2028, in response to animal welfare concerns. This does not extend to other livestock animals or modes of transport.
Despite 30 years of public scrutiny, the suffering of livestock at sea continues. In our new research, we wanted to understand how the meat industry manages to sustain the status quo.
We explored parts of the meat industry in Australia, Brazil and the United States. We found a highly concentrated global industry, with close ties to governments, a lack of regulatory oversight, and protective cultural norms. To address these power imbalances, we propose a different approach to regulation.
Industrial production, trade and consumption of meat is harmful in many ways.
Aside from the human health consequences of eating to excess or risking antibiotic resistance, many types of meat production operations produce substantial greenhouse gases. They also degrade and contaminate natural resources and contributes to biodiversity loss. Some operations also involve the exploitation of workers, or harmful treatment of animals.
But the true costs of mass production are typically diverted from the producer onto others. In economics, this is called cost-shifting.
How do they get away with it? Large profit-driven corporates in the industrial livestock and meat-processing sector wield significant economic and political influence. This enables many of the negative impacts associated with meat production to continue. It also means our capacity to regulate them is limited.
These issues are not unique to Australia. Our research looked at three case studies across global meat supply chains:
We found close relationships between governments and industry, strong cultural and social values around meat, a lack of transparency in supply chains, and undue influence on policy-making. All contributed to prioritising high levels of meat production, despite the harms involved.
The production and consumption of meat has surged in recent decades. Meat has become a staple in the modern Australian diet and a major export commodity.
Australia’s meat production depends on a powerful network of farmers, large-scale multinationals, powerful agribusiness representative groups, and close political and institutional relationships.
This network has successfully justified the practice of live export as essential to the economic and cultural interests of global food security.
Consequently, the live export trade is often portrayed as a “solution” to global hunger, overlooking that many populations already consume meat well in excess of nutritional needs.
The industry also emphasises live export as a significant economic contributor and employment provider in rural Australia. These organisations also make policy submissions and conduct their own research advocating for live export as a crucial sales channel for Australian producers.
We see similar power dynamics operating overseas.
In Brazil, substantial financial investment has been devoted to developing soybean production facilities. Most soybeans are grown to feed animals in feedlot production systems.
Close relationships between the meat industry and Brazilian politicians have enabled the industry’s expansion. In one case, a former governor of Mato Grosso – the largest area of the Amazon affected by deforestation for soy production – is also the owner of one of Brazil’s largest soybean producers. Such political relationships have also allowed for a softening of Brazil’s deforestation regulations.
Similar relationships exist in the US. During the COVID pandemic, meat-processing workers were vulnerable to infection because they work in close proximity. After a brief shutdown, a US meat industry trade group urged authorities to grant an exemption and reopen meat processing facilities.
This action was framed as “necessary” for economic reasons and to maintain domestic food supply. That’s despite the labour violations involved in compromising the safety of workers, many of whom were migrants or refugees who may not have felt empowered to advocate for their rights.
Policies proposed to address food system harms include consumption taxes, labelling schemes and education campaigns. But these are mostly “adjustments” to the food system, rather than structural changes.
Our research suggests a more holistic and multifaceted approach is needed across the food system – for instance, restricting foreign land ownership in Brazil to prevent further ecological damage in the Amazon. In the US, redistributing agricultural subsidies toward more small-scale, diverse and “agroecological” farming operations would foster more ethical and environmentally friendly food production. However, such a transition would also necessitate a reduction in the total amount of meat produced and consumed.
Changing cultural attitudes towards meat production may help too. Retailers can mandate ethical standards from their meat suppliers and include animal welfare in sustainability policies. National dietary guidelines and subsidies could also encourage people to eat more minimally processed plant foods and less meat for both human and planetary health.
More broadly, more diligent implementation of competition policy could break up the concentrated power of just a few large meat companies.
Katherine Sievert received funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council to conduct this research (APP1190933). She has also received funding from the World Health Organization for previous consulting work related to this topic. Katherine Sievert is an Executive Member and President of Healthy Food Systems Australia, a not-for-profit advocacy organisation promoting healthy, sustainable and equitable food systems for all Australians.
Christine Parker previously received funding from The Australian Research Council for a project entitled "Regulating food labels: The case of free range food products in Australia" (DP150102168). Christine Parker is an Executive member of the Australasian Animal Law Teachers and Researchers Association, and has contributed in the past to the work of the animal welfare lawyers sub group of the Corporations Law Committee of the Law Council of Australia.