Goodwood Pastoral Regeneration Project

Goodwood Pastoral Regeneration Project is a Human-Induced Regeneration (HIR) project located at Goodwood Station, approximately 46km northeast of the opal mining town of White Cliffs in outback New South Wales. It was registered in October 2021 and covers an expansive 35,299.31 hectares within the Central Darling Shire.

Human-Induced Regeneration projects involve changing land management practices to allow native trees to regrow and eventually achieve permanent, even-aged forest cover. For this specific project, the primary activity is carefully managing the timing and extent of livestock grazing. By reducing these suppression pressures, the project allows permanent native forests to naturally regenerate from in-situ seed sources, rootstocks, and lignotubers on land that had been previously cleared and where regrowth was suppressed for at least 10 years.

The White Cliffs region is historically known for vast sheep grazing runs and opal mining. The environment is distinctly semi-arid, experiencing very low average annual rainfall of around 245mm to 250mm. The landscape across the station features a diverse mix of soils, ranging from hard red clays and deep brown gibber stone plateaus to lighter limestone and softer soils along narrow floodplains.

Interestingly, Goodwood Station is a third-generation working sheep station run by proponents Louise and Zane Turner. In addition to running Merino and Dohne sheep and operating the carbon project to address historic land degradation, the couple runs "Goodwood Stationstay," a popular tourism business offering outback camping and shearers' quarters accommodation. The property borders the Paroo-Darling National Park, and the owners actively engage in regenerative agriculture, including creating fenced "seed nurseries" to help propagate and restore native species like speargrass, wiregrass, and lantern bush across the property.