By Steve Ryan
SYDNEY — Despite decades of attempts to convince governments of the public's will to save our remaining forests and wilderness areas, and the need to preserve biodiversity, the dollar has won the debate. Woodchips are evidently more valuable.
The NSW Carr Labor government came to power promising to vanquish the woodchippers by 2000 or earlier, take the logging industry into a new era of plantation-based sustainability and create a reserve system second to none. Inability to tackle the forest industries led to failure to achieve any of these goals.
Conservation groups, such as the Wilderness Society, are refocusing their attention away from politics and toward the woodchipping corporations, which are, the main perpetrators of forest destruction.
The Carr government recently passed forest legislation with the full support of the Liberal and National parties. This is the most regressive piece of environmental law in NSW for decades.
The Forestry and National Parks Estate Act 1998 (which governs forest agreements) condemns forests to up to 20 years of woodchipping and clear-felling, exempt from many existing environmental laws. Wilderness and old-growth forests, such as the Chaelundi wilderness, which has been protected for most of this decade, are threatened.
The government has given in to the forest industry's demands in order to avoid a corporate-sponsored backlash in key rural seats. The government cave-in severely limits the capacity of future governments to conserve forests without massive compensation payouts.
The corporations that own the rights to log are now most important in deciding the fate of our forests and must be the major focus of campaigning.
Boral, North Ltd and Daishowa are the major woodchipping corporations in eastern Australia, Bunnings in the west. A campaign to get Boral out of our native forests has been quietly continuing for several years.
The Boral campaign is on the verge of a major victory. Newcastle City Council has resolved to avoid any future commercial dealings (worth $5 million) with Boral until the company is no longer involved in woodchipping native forests. If Newcastle Council sets this precedent, other councils may pass similar resolutions. This would put significant pressure on Boral to review the activities of its timber division.
North Ltd and Daishowa are set to expand into areas of the state not currently heavily woodchipped. The profitability of these moves must be threatened with community action.
North Ltd is already under pressure for its role in the Jabiluka uranium mine. Shareholder pressure, international action affecting its European markets and negative publicity are taking their toll on the viability of Jabiluka. Similar pressure must be brought to bear on woodchipping operations.
The NSW Forest Alliance will be holding a public meeting at the Sydney Town Hall on February 28, 1pm, to launch the next phase in the fight to preserve forests. Speakers from conservation groups, Ian Cohen from the Greens and Arthur Chesterfield-Evans from the Democrats will attend.
[Steve Ryan is a forest campaigner for the Wilderness Society.]