By Marina Cameron
Less than two years ago, thousands of people took to the streets around Australia to protest against the Labor government's expansion of the woodchipping export quotas and the granting of licences to woodchip areas of high conservation value. The protesters were taking action on behalf of the 80% of the population that opinion polls showed opposed woodchipping of old-growth forests.
On October 31, the federal Coalition government took the next step, announcing a move from one- to three-year woodchip export licences.
This move rips the guts out of the already weak National Forest Policy developed by the ALP in government. Under the NFP, export licensing would eventually be based on regional forest agreements in each state which set aside "comprehensive" and "adequate" forest reserves. Until then, woodchip exports were to be controlled through "transitional" annual licences up to a national ceiling of 5.2 million tonnes.
The process of setting up these reserves was already flawed. Many areas identified for reserves had already been woodchipped, or included large areas of plantation forest. Some areas weren't even originally forest. The reserves included very few large consolidated forest areas with good survival prospects. The NFP package was more about providing resource security for logging companies than adequate environmental protection.
Regardless, most state governments managed to avoid signing agreements. Now, without any reserve system in place, the government will grant licences that will not even be reviewed annually. The new three-year licences will be granted within the framework of the government's June 11 announcement that the woodchip export quota would increase by 1 million tonnes from public forests, and that woodchips from private land would be exempt from the quota (allowing an estimated extra 1 million tonnes to go to export).
"This government claims to support the NFP, but has thrown away the safety valve of annual woodchip licensing", said the Australian Conservation Foundation's biodiversity campaigner, Peter Wright.
The change comes after intensive lobbying by the National Association of Forest Industries for an increase in the export quota. NAFI claimed that a 3-4 million tonne increase could be met from sawmill residue, forest regrowth and forests cleared for plantations. Forest experts have disputed this.
The industry's claim that the increase was necessary to protect jobs was, unfortunately, echoed by the forestry division of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union. Woodchipping is a highly capital-intensive industry, employing only 600-800 workers nationally. Over the last 25 years there has been a 40% job loss in the timber industry, but this has occurred alongside a push to restructure the industry to meet the woodchip export market. Only 2% of job losses in woodchipping have been due to conservation, with the remainder being the result of increased mechanisation and shrinking forest due to over-logging.
James Tedder, secretary of the North Coast Environment Council, said that the new regulations "will permit the increased export of Australia's forests and, just as serious, the export of Australian jobs. There is no pressure on the large export companies to add value to these woodchips in this country."
Logging companies continue to receive a considerable public subsidy through reduced royalties. Despite the potential for sustainable forestry based on plantations, coupled with a compensation and retraining program for workers employed in woodchipping, big business continues to pursue the more profitable avenue of exploiting native forests — which, unlike plantations, require no initial investment.
It is entirely clear whose side Labor and Liberal governments have been on. The 1996 Report on Funding Disclosed by Major Political Parties documents major donations from woodchipping companies to the National, Liberal and Labor parties. AMCOR alone donated $272,000 to the Coalition before the last federal election. Seven of the Coalition senators who voted in favour of changing the woodchip export regulation own shares in woodchipping companies, including Boral, Wesfarmers and North Ltd.
While the timber corporations would, in their ideal world, prefer the opportunity to have export quotas increased every year, for so long as there is any movement in defence of our native forests, three-year licences are a politically expedient option for both the timber bosses and their servants in government.