Rich Bowden
The site where a French team conducted the first scientific experiments in Australia is now the subject of an international furor following the Tasmanian government's decision to ignore its own heritage council recommendation and allow a major logging operation to proceed on the privately owned location.
The decision by Tasmanian heritage minister Ken Bacon to restrict protection to a 100-metre buffer zone around the ruins of the French garden and observatory at the site now known as Recherche Bay (or Research Bay) has angered a growing number of heritage experts and environmentalists, who are calling for the full protection of the peninsular area due to its unique historical, scientific and cultural interest.
In 1793-94, when European settlement of Australia was still in its infancy, a French expedition consisting of two ships, the Recherche and Esperance, landed on the peninsula near the southernmost tip of Tasmania to conduct a series of scientific studies.
The expedition, commanded by Captain Bruni D'Entrecasteaux, carried out landmark research into the Earth's magnetic field and built an observatory nearby. Jacques Julien Labillardiere — the team's botanist — collected thousands of samples of Australian flora throughout the peninsula, work that was to form the subject of his book Novae Hollandiae Plantarum Specimen published in 1804. More than 200 years later, the publication remains a key reference for botanists.
Significant too was the establishment of cordial relations with local Aborigines from the Lyluequonny tribe. In light of subsequent horrors experienced by Tasmanian Aborigines, who were driven to the brink of extinction as a result of European expansion in the small island state, these initial peaceful contacts made with the French explorers are of great cultural and historical significance.
Professor John Mulvaney, from the Australian National University and one of Australia's leading archaeologists, believes the whole peninsula should be preserved as a "cultural heritage" site.
"I suppose 25% of our knowledge of pre-European Aborigines comes from this little area, that little peninsula. And it seems to me that there is an area of 150 hectares or so which could be readily added to the World Heritage area", Professor Mulvaney told the ABC's Catalyst program on October 30.
"Many things, many human actions and incidents, happened over the landscape and we wish to preserve the thing as an entirety so that all those evidences are preserved."
Dr Claude Sastre, a visiting professor from the French Museum of Natural History who toured the site, supports these views, according to the December 22 Hobart Mercury. Calling for further study and a ban on any logging in the area where the French explorers worked, Sastre is calling on French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin to intercede.
The decision to allow logging has incensed environmental groups in Australia and around the world. In an email to me on January 18, Nick McKim, environmental spokesperson for the Tasmanian Greens, lambasted Bacon for his failure to adequately protect the site.
"The decision of heritage minister Ken Bacon to ignore the advice of the Tasmanian Heritage Council to list the North East Peninsula of Recherche Bay on the Tasmanian Heritage Register is a continuation of the Tasmanian government's propensity to place the interests of the forestry industry above all other Tasmanian interests including human health, other industry sectors and cultural heritage.
"The minister has failed to give adequate reasons for his decision to ignore the recommendations of the heritage council and has ignored the cultural landscape of the peninsular as well as the opinion of many qualified archeologists and historians."
Bacon has denied the accusations, claiming that the current heritage protection of a 100-metre protection zone around the French sites is adequate. Speaking to the ABC's 7.30 Report on November 29, Bacon said: "I believe what's put in place is a win-win situation because we have been able to protect the known historic heritage sites at Recherche Bay and at the same time recognise the rights of private landowners."
From Green Left Weekly, February 9, 2005.
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