Great Barrier Reef: Celebrating 50 years of protection and legacy in Far North Queensland

Celebrations marking 50 years of protecting the Far North’s greatest natural asset have sparked plans for a new annual festival on the Cassowary Coast.

Following a relentless campaign during the 1960s and 1970s, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Act was introduced to address development. Reef Authority’s Chief Scientist Dr. Roger Beeden on Moore Reef Photo: Braden Smith.

Celebrations marking 50 years of protecting the Far North’s greatest natural asset have sparked plans for a new annual festival on the Cassowary Coast.

Friday marked half a century since the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Act was signed into law to safeguard the natural asset from rampant development.

Following a relentless campaign in the Sixties and Seventies, Mission Beach resident John Busst sent thousands of letters to convince the government to quash rampent mining and destruction of the reef.

A celebration marking 50 years of protecting the Great Barrier Reef looks set to become an annual event. Picture: Supplied.

Mission Beach resident and event organiser Liz Gallie said the David and Goliath battle was why the Cassowary Coast was fuelled by tourism and not oil fields.

“It’s all about the whole of the Great Barrier Reef community celebrating how beautiful the Great Barrier Reef is,” Ms Gallie said.

It s“I think Mission Beach is the centre of that because that’s where it was fought for and that’s where it was won … it’s an extraordinary achievement by an extraordinary man.

“It’s the basis of our tourism and everything. Otherwise we would have had oil wells all up and down the coast and on the reef.”

Cassowary Coast Tourism supported three separate events over the weekend celebrations – a Dunk Island cocktail party, a community open day at John Busst’s home base Ninney Rise and a gala dinner to raise funds for the reef.

The GBR50 Mission Beach steering committee organiseed three events over the weekend to mark the 50th anniversary of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Act. Picture: Liz Gallie

Executive officer Patrick Bluett said the history was so significant it was pegged to become an annual celebration.

“It’s during our peak time but even still the accommodation looks very busy,” he said.

“The area really was the genesis of it all, it all started here.

“We are very much looking forward to making it an annual event.”

Mr Busst’s original fight began after a landowner wanted to mine a nearby reef for lime to fertlise their fields.

Decades later Reef Authority CEO Josh Thomas said the problems facing the reef were far less tangible.

“We’re really using the 50 years as a springboard to think about the next 50,” he said.

“Originally the marine park was listed because of concerns over extractive use or oil and gas extractive activities, coal mining for agricultural fertilisers. The risks that are faced now are much more sophisticated.

“What we’re really worried about now is the diverse and diffuse effects of things like marine debris, climate change, effects water quality from a range of sources in the catchments and really that requires a community effort.”

Originally published as Great Barrier Reef: Celebrating 50 years of protection and legacy in Far North Queensland