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To be deemed of outstanding universal value a property must meet criteria for both specific values and conditions of integrity and have in place adequate protection and management systems to ensure its safeguarding.
Failure at any time to meet integrity criteria risks placing a Site on the World Heritage List in Danger or possible delisting.
Since the State government purchased land at Springbrook so as to expand the National Park and World Heritage Area, meeting integrity criteria is an obligation. The World Heritage Convention considers “that deterioration or disappearance of any item of the cultural or natural heritage constitutes a harmful impoverishment of the heritage of all the nations of the world.” whc.unesco.org/en/conventiontext
Article 5 of the Convention states that the State Party (i.e. Commonwealth Government) …shall endeavour… (4) to take the appropriate legal, scientific, technical, administrative and financial measures necessary for the identification, protection, conservation, presentation and rehabilitation of this heritage; and (5) ….encourage scientific research in this field.”
The following are taken from the World Heritage Committee’s Operational Guidelines on Outstanding Universal Value and Integrity critera:
Outstanding Universal Value for the natural heritage means significance which is so exceptional as to transcend national boundaries and to be of common importance for present and future generations of all humanity. Thus the permanent protection of this heritage is of the highest importance to the international community as a whole.
Integrity is a measure of the wholeness and intactness of the natural heritage and its attributes. The property must
- include all elements necessary to fully express its outstanding universal value
- be of adequate size to ensure the complete representation of the features and processes which convey the property’s significance; and
- not suffer from adverse effects of development and/or neglect
For a natural property, biophysical processes and landform features should be relatively intact. Human activities, including those of local communities, need to be consistent with the outstanding universal value of the area and be ecologically sustainable.
Under criterion (vii) the property should include areas that are essential for maintaining the beauty of the property. Waterfalls should include adjacent catchment and downstream areas that are integrally linked. An area of rainforest would meet the conditions of integrity if it includes gradients in altitude, topography, soil types, and successional ages
Under criterion (x) relating to biological diversity, boundaries should include habitats for maintaining the most diverse fauna and flora characteristic of the biogeographic province and ecosystems under consideration. A complete assemblage of co-evolved interacting species, habitats for maintaining endemic, rare and phylogenetically significant biota, be large enough to include the most critical habitats essential to ensure the survival of viable populations of more wide ranging species, and, for migratory species, seasonal breeding and nesting sites and migratory routes wherever they are located. |
