The ENGO’s are only half of the problem – even if we had their support for native forest harvesting, imports would still outcompete the local product. The industry lost house framing to softwood plantations, and furniture has been lost to Ikea and others from Vietnam, Malaysia and China. Furniture, toilet paper, aluminium window frames, you name it – are all cheaper alternatives when imported. The real problem is the economic and ecological madness that passes for freemarket salvation in the minds of our political and academic establishment. They have made it easier for ENGOs to be lazy and argue that the local industry is already on its death bed due to market forces.

So, a central question is this: If foresters can and do maintain a sustainable resource in Australia - for who and for what?

"for who and for what?"

For the planet mate.

Good article Simon.

David

Some fair enough points in the article, but it would best be taken with a bex, a good lie down in company of David Lindenmayer’s Forest Pattern and Ecological Process (A synthesis of 25 years of research)

David Lindenmayer is nothing but an anti-logging green activist. He lacks any sense of perspective or proportionality.

This well argued article goes to the crux of the problem, which is the unsustainable campaign to end native forest timber harvesting resulting in perverse environmental outcomes. The minor amount of forest available for harvesting in Victoria and Tasmania poses little threat to conservation values. In return we receive a renewable forest product that lessens our impact on forests overseas that are not managed to worlds best practice.

The proposed forestry agreement will serve no useful purpose, given most Tasmanian forests are already protected, will cost a bucketload of taxpayer dollars and remove professional management from the forest.

About 20 years ago I belonged to a Bush Walking group which included a ranger from DSE who gave us some good instruction in how logging worked. Because I grew up in the bush, I already had a good idea how the ecology of the forest worked and I wrote a piece to be included in the Victorian Association of Bushwalking Clubs' Newsletter. The greenies of the association refused to publish it, so I sent it to the individual clubs. After that the article appeared in the Association's newsletter. I tried to explain to them that old growth forest doesn't last forever, ultimately is burnt in a forest wild fire, or else it dies, produces debris on the forest floor and rots away. If the forest is logged while the timber is still useful, good practice demands that the old hollow stags are left as a haven for the wildlife. After the logging coops are tidied up and the rubbish burnt, new plants grow and these produce vast amounts of food for the animals, so that we get a win, win situation, both for the foresters and the ecology. Greenies, bah - Humbug.

David

So radical conservationists give environmentalism a bad name and clear felling woodchippers give foresters a bad name. The uncompromising views of both sides deserve criticism. People like the author may have been consistent rational voices but the worst of the timber industry - that has been engaged in asset stripping for a long time - seems, to the public, to be unscrutinised by anyone but the radical greens.

Not all blame should be placed upon uncompromising and ill-informed radical greens; the industry itself has allowed and encouraged big industrial clear felling and made it clear they oppose any kind of restrictions on the basis of environmental impacts or sustainability of their practices.

The stupid three mines uranium policy has had one good effect. It meant that there was more uranium still in the ground to dig up, & sell, now that more rational policies prevail. Prices are better too.

What do you reckon? Will it be 10 20 or 50 years before we start cutting down these Forrests to feed out cooking fires.

When I was a kid, my family went out to an acquaintance's property, once a month, where he was clearing 500 acres for grazing. We would load a trailer load of timber for the stove, & the wood heater. I still have some of the muscles developed chopping up those logs into stuff to feed the stove.

If the greenies get their way, & get coal out of our power stations, even they will be gathering wood. Boy, wouldn't "I like to see that".

Nah! just as they went to water about dams, when lack of the stuff threatened their comfortable life, they will do the same with coal & electricity. We'll have to wait until we can't afford to import wood, for sense to prevail. By then, much of the standing timber will be useless for lumber, due to age.

Simon
Congratulations for writing one of the best articles on this topic.

Ken Fabos
".... but the worst of the timber industry - that has been engaged in asset stripping for a long time....."

Please explain. With regards to public native forests, the timber industry operates in legislated portions under regulations administered by state government agencies which decide where they operate, how much wood they take, and how they log. Not sure how they can assett strip under these circumstances.

".... the industry itself has allowed and encouraged big industrial clear felling and made it clear they oppose any kind of restrictions on the basis of environmental impacts or sustainability of their practices."

Sadly, this is straight out of the ENGO anti-forestry song-book. As per above, with regard to native forests on public land (which is where the ENGO campaigns are focussed) it is state government agencies (not the industry) who determine how forests are logged in accordance with silvicultural characterics which determine how best to regenerate them.

The industry operates under regulations such as Codes of Practice designed and administered by foresters specifically to minimise environmental impacts and ensure sustainability. I've yet to see the timber industry oppose this regulation.

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It's revealing what attitudes an article like this brings out of the woodwork. The article did point the finger at the environmental NGOs, and so one would expect to see some reactionary anti-forestry diatribe in response. But being down on environmental extremism isn't the same as being in favour of forestry extremism, which is what appears to drive some of the responses. It's a myth, for instance (in most cases at least), that logging a forest is 'good for the forest's nature'. But it's a truth that native forest management (meaning not just the act of logging but the whole set of management and policy systems in place around this) is not nearly as bad for its nature as the environmentalists make out; and - importantly - helps offset the societal need to get our wood products (from firewood to veneer, via toilet paper and construction timber) from elsewhere at higher ecological cost, as well as offsetting the use of resource- and energy-intensive alternatives such as concrete and steel. Of course, if society globally didn't place such demands on the planet's resources, we might not be having this debate. The article demonstrates just how 'grey' an area this is - not the black-and-white that extremists of either persuasion believe.

It is great to see a forest conservation scientist standing up to argue for the sustainable management of our forests, but is it too late to save the economic, environmental and social benefits that come from our native forest industry?

These benefits have been eroded by the campaign by green politicians, lobby groups and by activist academics.

In the 2004 Federal Election academics including Professor Tim Bonyhady, Director, Australian Centre for Environmental Law, the Australian National University and Dr Peter McQuillan (UTAS) had an open letter to condemn Tasmania’s forest management and claim that the scientific processes of its Regional Forest Agreement had been “overwhelmed by political compromises”.

The current downturn in markets started in 2007 when Peter McQuillan and the Greens’ Peg Putt visited Japan at the invitation of the Rainforest Action Network to lobby the customers of the pulp and paper companies not to take Tasmanian woodchips by claiming the last of the State’s old growth forest was being destroyed.

The visit to Japan saw the release of brochure from Rainforest Action Network that included a ‘horror’ photo of forestry that was actually a picture of the Hydro Lake King William at low level.

Dr McQuillan was also a witness for Greens Senator Brown at his Federal Court case to save the Wielangta stag beetle. In the ultimate irony the only recorded death of the extremely rare and endangered beetle was when one was killed by McQuillan to provide evidence!

Professor Bonyhady, became part of the Independent review of the Commonwealth’s EPBC Act that found, in 2009, in relation to the Tasmanian RFA:
“As a consequence of the Tasmanian RFA, 79 per cent of old growth forest and 97 per cent of high quality wilderness is in reservation. This exceeds the global target of effective conservation of 10 per cent each of the world's ecological regions, set out under the Convention for Biological Diversity. These achievements, which often go overlooked or unremarked in debate, deserve greater public recognition.”

So hopefully we will hear more from forest scientists like Simon and less of the activist academic.

You are right in that we wish this debate could end, but only if the ending is based on facts, which this biased article is not. Hardly surprising, considering who the author works for, a supporter of Forestry Tasmania and their clear and burn mentality.

The suggestion the ENGOs "make up your own answers and then go fishing for “evidence” to support your case" is insulting. I am part of the community science project to collect data for assessing the carbon content of our forests, a subject strangely neglected in this article. The program is under the supervision of the ANU, so hardly fits the above ad hoc description. The need for carbon accounting is supported by the government's Renewable Energy Credits, possibly one of the reasons Gunns has forsaken their 600,000 hectares of native forests as they might not have been able to afford to pay the RECs required.

In Tasmania, most logging IS clear fell, so why shouldn't it be called that? We have the debate over fires because some are necessary burning to reduce the deadwood load, but others are regeneration burns which destroy much that would be of value, both to the craftwood industry and to native wildlife who would appreciate having somewhere to live, and are done to create plantations (which their employees have told me is Forestry Tasmania's idea of a nice healthy forest) as believe it or not, regeneration of the forest would still happen without that destruction!

FSC is the only accredited certification system because it is the only one overseen by an independent body. Nuf said!

This is a prettily crafted article, designed to appeal to those who do not know enough, and haven't the incentive to find out more. Certainly not honest, factual, or intended to promote the unity the author says is so desirable.

Yeah, the clear felled disaster zones are just in my imagination and the biodiversity of what grows back in them exceeds what went before? A bad joke. Quality logs going into chippers or into windrows to be burned are also imaginary. They may have had permission, whether on public or private land. So what?

Not all forestry is practiced like that, thankfully, but don't tell me it doesn't exist - or isn't strongly defended by forest industry groups where it does. Unchallenged there wouldn't be any old growth forest off limits if elements of the industry had their way. Yes, old growth forest doesn't last forever but there won't be much forest reaching climax state unlogged as part of a natural succession to take it's place, not if the only form of management is management for the purpose of harvesting. It is not the same, not 'just as good' with 'more trees than before' - the 'more trees' being saplings.

Where's the big scrub forest with maturing red cedar or white beech? A few remnants are what's left, that are constantly in danger of rogues; a bit more remote and they'd be illegally stripped of the rarest and most valuable timber. I suppose I'll be told those practices don't exist either, despite personal and neighbours' experiences of "I don't believe the boundary is really where you say, get a surveyor, and they were just rubbish trees anyway, I've just done you a favour cutting them down" or dozer tracks on the bush block down to those big hoop pines - and the stumps are all that's left.

Now, I believe that well managed, sustainable harvesting of native forests should continue, it's scale limited by what is a limited resource with long regrowth times, with adequate reserves for biodiversity and wilderness. Taking ever smaller trees to beat those limits was always a mistake and it's the timber industry that's been doing that - and clear felling for woodchips; out of sight to the wider public it, the worst practices would go on unchecked.

Mudpuppy
Your post seems to epitomise what Simon is saying - that the young and idealistic have grown-up with ENGO anti-logging campaigns and have developed an ingrained belief that native forestry is 'evil' Clearly, you feel so strongly that something needs to be done about forests that you have joined an ENGO group (probably the Wilderness Society) which has formal policies to end the production of timber from our own forests.

As I understand it, ENGO's have instigated the "community science project to collect data for assessing the carbon content of our forests" as part of their over-riding campaign to end all native timber production.

The involvement of ANU is hardly surprising given its formal partnership with the Wilderness Society in the Wild Country Research Hub. You claim this gives the work credibility, but the close association of ANU with environmental activism and its role in producing discredited work with compromised peer review, such as the Green Carbon paper, has sadly diminished the objectivity of the ANU with regard to forests issues.

Your mention of Renewable Energy Credits as a reason for forsaking native forest timber production betrays your agenda. If RECs are applied across the board, there would be pressure to do much more (not less) Australian wood production given its very low carbon emissions compared to producing alternative materials such as steel, aluminium and concrete. But I suspect you see RECs being applied only to forests as a weapon to ensure their 'protection' which would be counter-productive to improving overall environmental outcomes.

You are wrong about clearfalling in Tas - the majority of timber harvesting is by some form of partial, or selective harvest. You voice all the standard misconceptions about Tas forestry, withouut acknowledging the key point that 75% of the public forests are already in some form of reserve and will not be logged, and that logged forests actually regrow.

Ken Fabos
"Yeah, the clear felled disaster zones are just in my imagination and the biodiversity of what grows back in them exceeds what went before?"

Funnily enough the Tas wet euc forests where clearfelling and burning occurs, naturally regenerate after being decimated by severe bushfire. So, clearfelling and the subsequent forest regeneration approximate the natural process. Perhaps you should come down and have a look at the several million hectares of Victorian forest burnt by wildfire since 2003, before you dismiss the clearfell and burn practice.

" ..... but there won't be much forest reaching climax state unlogged as part of a natural succession to take it's place, not if the only form of management is management for the purpose of harvesting."

You are ignoring the reality that most of the forest in Tas and elsewhere is not to be logged. Just 26% of Tas public forest is being used on a cycle of harvest and regrowth, so there is 74% of forest which has the potential to reach the climax state.

"Where's the big scrub forest with maturing red cedar or white beech? A few remnants are what's left, that are constantly in danger of rogues; a bit more remote and they'd be illegally stripped of the rarest and most valuable timber ......"

I don't know too much about QLD and north NSW, but wasn't it land clearing for agriculture over a century ago which deciomated the species you refer to? It is erroneous to try to equate this with sustainable native forestry being practiced on a portion of public forest land in Tas in 2010.

"Now, I believe that well managed, sustainable harvesting of native forests should continue, it's scale limited by what is a limited resource with long regrowth times, with adequate reserves for biodiversity and wilderness"

You have obviously been badly influenced by the misrepresentations of Tasmanian native forestry if you don't appreciate that this is already the case. This epitomises what the article said about how most people have been influenced by misconceptions by ENGOs uncritically peddled through the media.

Facts related to the management of public forests can be easily checked. Forestry Tasmanian publishes a sustainable forest management report and the independent Forest Practices Authority published its own annual report.

This is available at http://www.fpa.tas.gov.au/fileadmin/user_upload/PDFs/General/FPA_annual_report_2009-10.pdf and Table 1.3.2 shows the area covered by forest operations in native forests by harvest method, future land use and tenure.

For the public native forest, that is subject to these Statement of Principles, the breakdown of forest practices plans certified in 2009 -10 is
• Partial Harvest 7, 917 ha
• Clearfell followed by reseeding 4,451 ha
• clearfell and convert to eucalypt plantation 29 ha
• Clearfell and convert to pine plantation 0 ha
• Clear fell and convert to a non forest use 230 ha

This was a total of 12,627 ha of which 63% was not clear felled.

So much for the accuracy and credibility of claims that “most logging is clear fell”.
Even on private property that is excluded from this latest process less than 50% is clear felled.

Public native forest covers over 2.2 million ha of Tassie which 1.4 million is reserved and only 603,000 ha is planned for timber production. Much of this is vibrant regrowth resulting from harvest and regeneration based on the silviculture method determined by the forest scientist.

This silviculture is so good that the icon forests of the Styx and Florentine Valleys and the Tarkine have been subject to industrial harvesting for the last 70 years and the Styx was the birth place of the clearfell, burn and sew silviculture that was employed in only 4,451 ha of forest last year. Yet these icions are portrayed as pristine wilderness by most environmental lobby groups.

The statement that forests regrow after bushfire is correct, but regeneration burns in Tasmania are nothing like the normal type of bushfire: they are high intensity burns, using petroleum jelly commonly known as napalm, (as used in the Vietnam war) which burns everything, even the carbon in the soil. With carbon content of up to 1500 tonnes per hectare, excluding the carbon in the soil, that is a heavy load of carbon that is transported to the upper atmosphere where it does the most damage as a greenhouse gas.

Mudpuppy, perhaps you should read

http://www.forestrytas.com.au/assets/0000/0780/abstract.pdf

David

It's ultimately a hollow argument to compare how forests are managed for wood with how nature would 'manage' those same forests with fire. While the differences in the disturbance events are slight, they are clearly not the same, and of course the regenerating forest arising after the disturbance will not be identical either. However, most species in a forest don't particularly care whether the disturbance was wildfire or a regeneration burn, because they're simply responding to the aftermath of a fire. Some species do distinguish though, for example those that like more residual structure than some forms of harvesting are able to leave. But the point isn't to keep tweaking native forestry until every hectare of forestry land is indistinguishable from what nature does in those other hectares of conservation reserves, because we're using these forests for different purposes. In the case of conservation reserves, it's (theoretically) to allow nature to take its course in the interests of maximising the chances of the local species being able to persist there. In the case of forestry land, it's to periodically extract resources from them, while minimising the loss of conservation value. Overall, the way that native forestry is done in Tasmania, and the policy context in which it occurs, means that the impacts on nature are far slighter than the comparable impacts of, say, a combination of plantation forestry, importation of wood from other people's native forests, and product substitution. As for carbon, again, there are differences but modelling would suggest that forestry land can ultimately sequester more carbon than conservation land - but you need to change perspective, from the here and now of the aftermath of a regeneration burn or wildfire, to a longer-term time horizon and broader landscape view. At these larger scales, the additional carbon sequestration provided by forest products is more evident. Let's hope that the management of our forests isn't ever driven solely by the need to sequester carbon - chances are that few of us would relish the consequences because it would be a very different sort of management from what nature does.

What an excellent article Simon. I absolutely agree with every point you have made, many of which have been confirmed by some of the posts that attempt to vilify your carefully and concisely expressed views. I have nothing further to add, apart from to say that I am proud to have spent the past 37 years working in Tasmania's Forest Industry and have been lucky enough to have worked with people such as yourself and Mark Poynter, along with a myriad of other Professional Foresters who share your views! We all have plenty to be proud of and nothing to be ashamed of, apart from the disgraceful way the media, particularly the Mercury and ABC, have treated us all for far too long!

What a cleverly-contrived piece of evil corporate spin. Far too clever to have originated solely from within Forestry Tasmania, more likely FT is still lap-dogging for the big overseas players who control this industry. Well-intentioned people who comment on forestry in Tasmania should first have a close look at the PULP MILL ASSESSMENT ACT 2007, including its totally anti-democratic SECTION 11, and the circumstances surrounding the ACT's creation. Also, it is, perhaps, significant that this FT post is supplied through Creative Commons, an organisation which is unable to understand the difference between the noun LICENCE and the verb LICENSE.
Oldfartwarren, Launceston Tasmania

This author knows what he is talking about, there are good suggestions here about sustainable native forestry BUT I do not see anywhere amid all this talk of management, scientific approach, etc the idea: leave some of it utterly alone, as it has been for millenia beyond counting. Must every inch of the world be 'peopled', managed, economised? Can we not have some preserves of genuine wilderness where nature does its complex business unmolested? If lightning strikes, there'll be fire. If it doesn't, it'll rot, the critters and fungi and micro-organisms will do their work. Leave it alone. Protect it. How many spots on earth do you think will be like that in 100 years time? The few will be beyond price for science, for careful careful tourism and above all, for themselves. Some things are ends in themselves, aren't they?

Dear Phil

The author doesn't have the space in his original article to cover every conceivable question the activists might fire at him.
On page 3 of the Comments MW Poynter explains that 74% of Tasmania's forests ARE PERMANENTLY reserved.

Once again you have proved the authors assertion that nearly all complaints aimed against the native forestry industry are baseless and unfounded - stemming from bias and ignorance of the wilfully uniformed.

Tis true, tis pity, pity tis tis true: I cannot get the thought of those monumental piles of wood chips on the wharf at Burnie out of my mind. Perhaps the first(and last) sight of Burnie the passengers on those cruise ships enjoy are those impressive mounds of wood chips.
I used to think that the word" sustainable" when used in relation to forest 'managemen't of our publicly owned native forests meant forest practice geared to ensuring the ongoing viability of the forests, including recognition of their v alue as carbon sinks. Until I learned that sustainability is about preserving the management status quo.
Why is this Forest Agreement so scary a proposition to many of the above comment posters?

Gran, it might not have ocurred to you that the wood chips are going to be made into products which people are going to use. In most applications these will have a long life and the carbon contained therein will not be returned to the atmosphere.

On the other hand, if the material is left on the forest floor, even if it just rots and is not burnt, a lot of the decomposition products ultimately become CO2 and add to the amount in the atmosphere. Growing trees do not last forever, as has been pointed out on many ocassions, in the natural environment they ultimately die, rot away or are burned in wild forest fires.

David

A family member was given the Anna Krien book Into the Woods for Christmas
After the recipient, normally a slow and carefully comprehending reader, finished the book inside a week I picked it up and consequently I would urge all contributing to this discussion to read it.
For anyone not familiar with how things are done in Tasmania, this is required reading.
Oh, and a happy 2011 to all.
gran