Cutting-edge technologies to better protect threatened plants and animals are being rolled out across Australia under the new $11.4 million Threat Innovation Grants program.
Researchers and ecologists have teamed up on 10 new projects to take existing conservation tools and technologies to the next level.
Many of them are leveraging artificial intelligence to help land managers better control invasive animals, weeds and diseases to protect endangered species.
Announced today on Endangered Species Day, the projects funded by the Albanian government include:
- $1.5 million for air sampling devices that detect invasive myrtle rust spores at nine botanical gardens – an early warning system to better protect gums, paperbarks and lillypillias
- $707,000 to use drones and AI-based image processing to better detect and map invasive weeds in multiple states
- $1.3 million to train detector dogs to identify the plant disease Phytophthora, which causes plant dieback and threatens many native plants in Tasmania, New South Wales and Western Australia
- $188,000 to train AI-powered Felixer traps to identify Tasmanian devils so they are not treated as targets.
Through these projects, conservationists and communities will be able to better manage threats to our native plants and animals on a large scale and in remote locations.
The $11.4 million native species and invasive pest program is just one part of the government’s $550 million investment to protect native species and combat invasive pests. It comes after the government this week announced a $60 million investment in 55 projects to combat stray cats.
Quotes attributable to Minister of Environment and Water, Tanya Plibersek:
“The threats to our precious native plants and animals are evolving – and that means our solutions must evolve too.
“We must all work together to find new and innovative solutions to stay ahead in the fight to protect our endangered species and biodiversity.
“That’s what makes the new $11.4 million Threat Innovation grant so important. Researchers and conservationists have come together to develop new technologies, methods and tools that experts and land managers can deploy at scale.”
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