Scenic Rim Residents have continued their push to have the area protected from coal mining, by rallying on the Gold Coast as part of a global day of action against coal seam gas.
The colourful Broadbeach event on Sunday attracted speakers from surrounding regions, who told the crowd of almost 200 of current exploration for coal and coal seam gas in their areas, as well as their concerns if mining company plans are allowed to come to fruition.
Innes Larkin, spokesman for Keep The Scenic Rim Scenic, warned almost the whole of the Scenic Rim is covered by mining exploration licenses. This includes the historic towns of Boonah, Kalbar and Aratula.
Mr Larkin told the rally his group - a sub-committee of Boonah Organisation For A Sustainable Shire - was working hard to make sure all permits were rescinded to protect the nationally significant region.
"The Scenic Rim is part of the largest tract of sub tropical rainforest in the world, part of the second largest remnant shield volcano in the world, the third most biodiverse region in Australia, and listed by Tourism Australia as a national landscape ... an area of national significance so important they promote it to the world as an internationally significant tourism region," he said.
Scenic Rim Shire Council appeared to offer disheartened residents a glimmer of hope last week, when it announced it will lobby the State Government to overturn all exploration permits, under a provision of the Natural Resources Act.
A similar "Restricted Area" protection is understood to cover the Greater Springfield Development near Ipswich.
As placards calling for protection of the Scenic Rim and its assets waved in sea of other slogans at Sunday's rally, farmers stood shoulder-to-shoulder with concerned residential land-owners and city folk to listen to speakers outline what they consider to be the risks posted by coal seam gas.
They heard of potential for impacts on underground water supplies, agricultural operations including organic farms, displaced communities, health and loss of biodiversity.
Adam Sharah also spoke on behalf of Indigenous Australia, warning it was now not only Aboriginal people who were being effected by what he described as the "divide and conquer approach of the mining industry, which had been successful in dispossessing Aboriginal People from the Land".
Mr Shara said he could see a pattern of big corporations working to disenfranchise landholders through fragmentation of communities.
" It is a far more insidious and sophisticated version of "conquer and divide" that is employed today, as Mining companies now influence our education system, and are in fact the main providers for Aboriginal scholarships, and employment opportunities," he said.
Mr Shara said he believed mining company funding and involvement made communities uneasy, believing they found themselves compromised, when it came to resisting mines or mining expansion.
As the rally wound to a close, protesters staged an impromptu march through Broadbeach, calling loudly for an end to coal seam gas.
Photography by Mark Michael.