When more than 40 freshwater sawfish were reported to be dying in a parched billabong on a cattle station owned by billionaire Gina Rinehart in Western Australia's far north, State Government bureaucrats swung into action.

Emails show WA department wanted to prevent news of the protected sawfish deaths being reported by the media

The WA government is considering prosecuting a Chinese company over unauthorised land clearing at a pastoral station in the state's north as shocked traditional owners say important flora including boab trees have been ripped up.

Traditional landowners in the North West have been left devastated after a Chinese-owned company destroyed a large portion of sacred bushland allegedly without the appropriate permissions.

Environmental activist group Environs Kimberley has called on the state government to prosecute Shanghai Zenith for the unauthorised clearing of land at Yakka Munga pastoral lease, 120 kilometres east of Broome.

The final global stronghold for the critically endangered freshwater sawfish has seen numbers dramatically decline after at least 40 sawfish were found dead last December.

The deaths were reportedly due to high temperatures and declining water levels in two pools at Blina Creek at Liveringa Station, a Kimberley cattle station owned by Gina Rinehart.

Conservation groups have called for tougher penalties for illegal land clearing, as the Western Australian Government continues to investigate a Chinese-owned company over the mysterious clearing of 120 hectares at Yakka Munga cattle station in the Kimberley.

Western Australian environmental organisation Environs Kimberley is integrating local Indigenous ecological knowledge with science to better its environmental upkeep projects.

The Pastoralists and Graziers Association is talking up a "once-in-a-lifetime" commitment by Gina Rinehart's Hancock Prospecting to tap into the Fitzroy River to "supercharge" the cattle industry.

Published: ABC News - 20 May 2019

Environs Kimberley director Martin Pritchard said the road could become the "road to Paradise Lost" unless more was done to protect "this jewel of Aboriginal culture and nature-based tourism on Broome's doorstep"...

Published in the Lonely Planet - 22nd May 2019

Environs Kimberley, an environmental organisation working in the area, told ABC News that more work was needed to protect “this jewel of Aboriginal culture.”