News briefs

Issue 

Hinchinbrook appeal denied

On March 13, the Friends of Hinchinbrook lost their application for special leave to the High Court to appeal the Federal Court's decision last year to allow Cardwell Properties' planned tourist resort at Oyster Point, adjacent to Hinchinbrook Island in north Queensland.

Hinchinbrook Island is part of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, a World Heritage-listed area. As resorts go bust along Queensland's coast, however, it looks like the destruction of mangroves and endangered dugong habitat at Oyster Point might be for nothing. Not one title of land has been transferred to buyers and there is still no building at the site, just a "razed landscape of mangrove and melaleuca stumps", said the Wilderness Society's Virginia Wade.

"Regardless of the court's decision, the community will not allow Port Hinchinbrook to go ahead", she said.

Labelling genetically engineered food

The Australia NZ Food Authority (ANZFA) is set to announce a new standard under which genetically engineered foods will not be labelled. "At industry's bidding, ANZFA will ignore the 90% of people who want truthful labels", said GeneEthics director, Bob Phelps.

"Genetically engineered foods are just out of the Petri dish and their impacts in the food supply will not be known for years. Only labels will allow shoppers to choose ... Irradiated and synthetic foods (such as Olestra), which ANZFA is also set to approve, should also be identified and labelled", he said.

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