Friday 22 May 2009, International Biodiversity Day, saw widespread devastation across the Northern Rivers of New South Wales and South East Queensland due to storms and major flooding. Despite the chaotic conditions over sixty delegates of the 112 who had registered, attended the Koala Conservation Conference held in Lismore.

What attendees heard was not news to them –continuing habitat loss, disease and deficiencies in our knowledge regarding its impact, together with ineffectual government responses are rapidly driving the koala to extinction along the eastern seaboard. No longer is there a question of ‘if’; it is a matter of when and how fast.

From the day-long agenda of presentations and discussions an issues-based action plan is being developed to take to all levels of government and to the community. During this week a communications strategy and conference communique have been drafted, letters to the editor have been published and data on koala mortalities collected for forwarding to Canberra.

Periodic email contact is being maintained with all those who registered for the Koala Conference. The organizing committee’s priority is to publish and distribute the Conference Proceedings by the end of July 2009.