Australians are not managing their wildlife but exterminating it. Frightening new evidence comes from a combination of kangaroo industry jitters over the collapse in kangaroo numbers and a leaked government report which reveals that almost 3,000 different types of ecosystems are threatened with half already beyond salvation. Almost 1,600 bird, mammal and reptile species could die out before the end of the century.

One third of all the world's mammals which have become extinct since the 1600s were Australian. Now, a further 346 vertebrates, eight invertebrates and 1,241 plants are under threat. Land clearance for agriculture and building are the primary causes and the report calls for an end to the destruction of all native vegetation. There is little hope of this when a staggering 1.236 million acres (500,000 hectares) are cleared every year.

The Kangaroo Industries Association of Australia (KIAA) have consistently labeled the kangaroo as a threat to the country's environment but this report clearly gives the lie to that nonsensical claim. It isn't the kangaroo which threatens Australia but humans.

This embarrassing report is revealed at the same time as a letter from Ray Davis, President of the NSW Kangaroo Industry Association (KIA) to the National Parks & Wildlife Service became public. It pleads for a reduction in the slaughter of kangaroos for 'damage mitigation' - although not a reduction in the numbers which the KIA kills for profit! Australia is experiencing one of the worst droughts this century, during which millions of kangaroos have died.

The KIA says: "Most processors in NSW are now seeing marked effects of the drought in terms of stock supply ... we are increasingly concerned over the health of the population as a resource post drought."

Despite these warnings, the Government is authorising a further massive 'cull' of kangaroo numbers for what it terms 'damage mitigation'. In its letter, the KIA reminds the Government that kangaroo are not pests and adds:

"... the one strategy most likely to significantly depress kangaroo populations to extremely low levels in the long term, is heavy culling immediately before the breaking of a long-term drought". With winter approaching, these are precisely the conditions under which the cull will take place.

The letter goes on to question the Government's motives by saying: "... unless , of course, it is the intention to place the population under an unsustainable high level of culling pressure". The KIA's answer to the problem is not to end or even suspend the killing of kangaroos but simply to place a minimum size limit of those slaughtered.

While the KIA pretends that the long-term survival of kangaroos is not in question, the near hysteria and confrontational tone of its letter to its most ardent supporter tells a different story. Viva! has consistently maintained that the Australian Government's management of wildlife has been a disaster and that its assurances about its long-term survival are meaningless. Both of these leaked documents support our view.

It reveals the desperate situation which has developed when one of the most red-necked and blood thirsty industries in he country, which has always viewed wildlife as nothing more than a profit source, accuses its creator of threatening the long-term survival of the kangaroo.

Countries around the world and manufacturers such as Adidas, who readily buy the body parts of Australia's wildlife, are complicit in the guilt. They willingly accept the assurances of a Government which doesn't know what it is doing, doesn't care and has been exposed as incompetent and irresponsible.