In June 2007, a national conference in Tasmania organised by Tamar Natural Resource Management examined the integration of biodiversity and production. This conference developed The Tamar Principles ⁵ for the integration of biodiversity:

Respect:

The respect for nature and natural process starts with respect for ourselves and for others.

Consider the Future:

There is a duty of care to those around us as well as to future generations.

Set Goals:

Clear unambiguous goals that allow management to be matched to the scale of the goal should be set.

Be Open:

To be open to novel management techniques and ways of thinking.

Learn:

Personal anecdotes, the experiences of our neighbours, scientific and technical writing: we listen and learn from them all.

Demonstrate:

To record our success and our failures and reorganise, celebrate and promote all who progress.

Share:

To seek ways to share or spread across the whole community the costs of biodiversity.

A characteristic of all case studies identified in this review was that each manager was actively using some or most of these principles. Another common theme was that individuals expressed a desire to work with rather than against nature. In some cases, this required using less inputs and not trying to ‘control’ the environment (e.g. by reducing high levels of inputs, farming systems became more flexible and able to respond to different seasonal conditions). This provided additional lifestyle benefits.

⁵ Lloyd (2007), Tamar Principles