World Heritage Magnetic Island

Magnetic Island is surrounded by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park with the island, in it's entirety, (protected estate and non-protected estate, terrestrial and marine environments), forms part of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area.

Nearly 70% percent of the land environment of Magnetic Island is protected as part of the Magnetic Island National Park, or Conservation Park.

The Island presents expressions of many World Heritage values, including values which are uniquely expressed on the Island at the scale of the entire WHA, (i.e., they occur on Magnetic Island and nowhere else on the WHA), (1).

Matters of National Environmental Significance

There are also many other Matters of National Environmental Significance (2) that occur on Magnetic Island, e.g., green turtles nesting on our beaches, whale calving in bays, many migratory bird species, amongst others.

See the 1981 "World Heritage List" Map PDF

1. See Kenchington R and Hegeri E, 2005. World Heritage Attributes and Values Identified for Magnetic island and the Surround Marine Environment. Report to the Commonwealth Department of Environment and Heritage, and also MICDA and MINCA 2004. Magnetic island's World Heritage Values - a preliminary assessment.

2. The matters of national environmental significance are:

Listed threatened species and ecological communities.
Migratory species protected under international agreements
Ramsar wetland of international importance
The commonwealth marine environment
World Heritage properties
National Heritage places
Great Barrier Reef Marine Park
Nuclear actions, and
A water resource, in relation to coal seam gas deveolpement and large coal mining development.

Source: Australian Department of Environment Matters of National Environmental Significance Significant Impact Guidelines 1.1 Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.