France 24 reports on Australia’s ongoing rabbit crisis
A 24 June 2026 report from France 24 highlights the continued environmental and economic damage caused by hundreds of millions of rabbits, introduced by British settlers in the mid-19th century.
According to a report by France 24 correspondents Grégory Plesse and Quentin Théron, published on 24 June 2026, Australia continues to grapple with a severe ecological and economic challenge driven by an overpopulation of invasive rabbits. The French international broadcaster describes the situation as an ongoing disaster, noting that the species has devastated the landscape and placed significant pressure on the agricultural sector.
The report traces the origin of the crisis to the mid-19th century, when British settlers introduced rabbits to the continent specifically for sport hunting. Unlike in their native range, the introduced population encountered an ecosystem devoid of natural predators. This absence of biological checks allowed the numbers to explode exponentially across the continent within a matter of decades, establishing a permanent presence in the Australian environment.
Despite extensive government and private sector interventions over the subsequent century, the problem has not been resolved. The France 24 segment notes that mass eradication campaigns have been launched repeatedly throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. However, these efforts have failed to eliminate the species, leaving an estimated hundreds of millions of rabbits still roaming the country.
The persistence of the population continues to have tangible impacts on land management and farming. The report characterises the current state of affairs as tormenting for Australian farmers, who face ongoing challenges in protecting their livelihoods from the grazing habits of the invasive species. The scale of the infestation suggests that previous policy approaches have been insufficient to bring the numbers down to manageable levels.
While the report does not provide precise census data or specific monetary figures regarding the economic cost, it frames the issue as a long-standing institutional failure to manage an introduced species. The France 24 coverage underscores the difficulty of reversing ecological damage once a species has established itself in a new environment without natural predators.
