Governance Strategies to Manage and Monitor Cumulative Impacts at the Local and Regional Level

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This 18 month study commenced in October 2010. It examined the growing use of multi-stakeholder collaborative approaches for monitoring and managing cumulative impacts, focusing particularly on how these are being applied in the Bowen Basin to the management of water quality (Fitzroy Partnership for River Health) and dust issues (Moranbah Cumulative Impacts Group). The work undertaken by the CSRM project team focused on:

· Multi-stakeholder approaches for management of water and dust issues in the Bowen Basin; and

· Governance issues and implications of using these structures and processes.

This project aims to enhance mining industry efforts to proactively address the management of cumulative environmental and socio-economic impacts at the community and regional scale and strengthen the capacity of the industry to engage with planners, regulators and others in multi-stakeholder processes for monitoring and managing such impacts associated with mining. Specifically, the results of this study will:

· Equip the industry with details of considered and practical governance responses to address cumulative impacts; and

· Position the industry to respond to regulatory and policy changes arising from the Queensland Government's Sustainable Resource Communities policy and the increased attention to the cumulative impacts of coal mining in the Bowen Basin.   

The objectives of the work were twofold. First, to identify key considerations about governance arrangements required to support collaborative approaches for managing and monitoring cumulative impacts in the Bowen Basin. The second objective of this work was to formulate models and options with respect to multi-stakeholder action to address cumulative impacts.