Businesses should fund conservation: Hunt

The private sector may be called on by the federal government to help Australia's endangered species.

Federal Environment Minister Greg Hunt has also declared war on feral cats, demanding two million be culled by 2020 to reduce their environmental impact.

Speaking outside the inaugural National Threatened Species Summit in Melbourne, Mr Hunt said the federal government could not do all the heavy lifting on its own to save threatened plants, birds and animals.

He said he supported a New Zealand-style national threatened species trust in which businesses funded conservation projects.

"I think the New Zealand model is a tremendous example for Australia," Mr Hunt said.

He said feral cats had wiped out at least 27 mammal species and brought many others to the brink of extinction.

Mr Hunt also wants to see the establishment of five new island and 10 new mainland havens free of feral cats, and new feral cat control measures across 10 million hectares of land.

But the Places You Love Alliance, a group of more than 40 environmental and community organisations, said new funding and set targets had to be backed by tougher laws.

"Any new threatened species programs and monies offered by the Commonwealth are welcomed by the PYL Alliance," PYL delegate and Humane Society International chief executive Michael Kennedy said.

"But unless they are complemented by the very strongest federal environment laws that give the federal environment minister little leeway in decisions affecting the protection of listed species and habitats, then the efforts of one half of the threatened species recovery equation will simply and dramatically frustrate the other."