The first round of the Australian Government Biodiversity Fund is now open for applications. This program, part of the Clean Energy Future, will allocate around $946m over the next six years to help land managers store carbon, enhance biodiversity and build greater environmental resilience across the Australian landscape.

To do this, it will fund eligible land managers for activities which restore, manage and better protect biodiversity on public and private land. It will also provide support to land managers who wish to take advantage of emerging opportunities in the new carbon market. The Biodiversity Fund will provide support to establishing new carbon stores or better managing carbon stores of existing native habitat.

The Biodiversity Fund will invest in three main areas:

• Biodiverse plantings: Funding will help land managers expand native habitat on their property through planting mixed vegetation species appropriate to the region. This will help build landscape resilience and connectivity.
• Protecting and enhancing existing native vegetation: Funding will support land managers to protect, manage and enhance existing native vegetation in high conservation areas on their land for its carbon storage and biodiversity benefits.
• Managing threats to biodiversity: Funding will control the threat of invasive pests and weeds in a connected landscape.

Further information on the Biodiversity Fund, including a link to the application form, is available on the following website: http://www.environment.gov.au/cleanenergyfuture/biodiversity-fund/index.html [1]