Invasive Buffel Grass Explodes Across Central Australia After Record Rainfall

Parts of Central Australia have experienced their wettest year on record, causing an explosion of buffel grass — a highly invasive weed that spreads across the country "like a cancer".

The grass was brought in from Africa and parts of Asia more than 50 years ago to control dust and improve pasture, but recent heavy rain has seen the weed "explode" across SA and the NT, according to the Arid Lands Environment Centre (ALEC).

Advocacy and policy advisor for Central Australia's peak environmental organisation Kathleen Herbert said it has been frightening to watch the weed run rife through the interior.

Invasive Species Council senior advocate James Johnston said the weed was headed towards Port Pirie in South Australia's Spencer Gulf.

"It wouldn't take much for it to spread further down into Adelaide and then be a vector for the rest of the state … and east into New South Wales," he said.

"It's worrying."

Buffel grass spreads at 400 seeds per head, dominates native ecosystems and can fuel bushfires.

It can also impact traditional Aboriginal cultural practices and native bush food.

However, pastoralists advocate for the weed as a food source for cattle in dry regions where other vegetation struggles to grow.

Mr Johnston is concerned buffel grass could soon reach the Flinders Ranges, which the Prime Minister has pitched to UNESCO for a World Heritage listing.

The Invasive Species Council and ALEC are among the groups advocating for buffel grass to be declared a Weed of National Significance (WONS).

Calls for weed management to be strengthened

The South Australian government has just announced it will extend its buffel grass coordinator role after the funding for it was meant to end yesterday.

However, as rain continues to spread the weed across the state, Mr Johnston and Ms Herbert said the role needed to be strengthened.

"More action is required to match the scale of this issue," Mr Johnston said.

He said the government was still working out where funding would exactly come from, but it needed $2 million, more than four times its current government funding allocation.

Buffel grass has already spread to culturally-significant Indigenous sites including the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park.

The SA Minister for Climate, Environment and Water, Emily Bourke, said funding would continue and that the role would "transition into a cross-agency position".

"National coordination is extremely important because there's so many places where buffel grass is crossing borders, and so many national stakeholders [are] involved," said Ms Herbert of the Arid Lands Environment Centre.

She also maintained a strong state-based buffel grass coordinator was critical.

In a statement, Alinytjara Wilurara Landscape Board said "buffel does not respect boundaries and borders, and we're pleased that the role of a state buffel grass coordinator is continuing".

It said it would continue to work with communities and partners to manage buffel grass.