Support and sponsorship

An important element of the program's success is the cooperation and support of local communities and companies. Many private landowners and Land Conservation District Committees have helped with fox-baiting by laying baits on their own land where it is next to conservation reserves and State forest.

In addition to Government funding, significant sponsorship is helping in the recovery of chuditch, woylies, bilbies, bandicoots and numbats. The two main sponsors of Western Shield are Alcoa World Alumina Australia and Tiwest Joint Venture. Each is allocated a geographical area and has a program named for its sponsorship.

Tiwest is injecting $300,000 into Western Shield over a five-year period to cover operations in the Jurien to Lancelin region, where it is hoped the quenda, woylie, tammar wallaby, western barred bandicoot, bilby and boodie will be able to be re-established in the area.
Aerial baiting will cover 100,000ha and Tiwest’s Cooljarloo mine site will be hand baited to increase the total baited area.

Alcoa is also a major sponsor of the program, sponsoring $120,000 a year to assist with baiting of 550,000ha of northern jarrah forest from Dwellingup to Collie. Noisy scrub birds have been translocated to this area.

In the past Cable Sands sponsorship has assisted in the rejuvenation of around 200,000 hectares of the South Coast component of the program, covering D’Entrecasteaux and Shannon National Parks. Eight threatened or rare species including Western ground parrots, chuditch, dibblers, quokkas, brushtail possums and woylies are candidates for reintroduction into these areas.

Iluka Resources Ltd has also provided past sponsorship for the area between Margaret River, Augusta, Nannup, Donnybrook and Capel (the Sunklands), including the Leeuwin Naturaliste National Park and other forests and reserves around Bunbury and Busselton. The chuditch, quenda, quokka, brushtail possum, ringtail possum, western brush wallaby and the woylie are benefiting from fox control in this area.