Logging plan puts squeeze on Victoria’s high value native forests

Victoria has taken the dubious title of being the largest logger of Australian native forest by volume, accounting for around a third of all native forest logged in the country over the past year. The state government agency VicForests logged more than 1.3 million cubic metres of wood from Victoria’s native forests, almost 100,000 cubic …

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VicForests logs Powerful Owl habitat for …. firewood?

You’ve got to be joking, right? VicForests are spruiking the importance of  firewood as a sustainable product from Parlour’s Creek coupe. Is firewood really such an important part of their business model? Which kind of means that they’re logging Powerful Owl and Greater Glider habitat for firewood! Minister d’Ambrosio – can you and your Department …

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Protected forests in Europe felled to meet EU renewable targets – report

Europe’s bioenergy plants are burning trees felled from protected conservation areas rather than using forest waste, new report shows Protected forests are being indiscriminately felled across Europe to meet the EU’s renewable energy targets, according to an investigation by the conservation group Birdlife. Up to 65% of Europe’s renewable output currently comes from bioenergy, involving …

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Eden chip mill back in action

The Eden chip mill is buzzing with activity again, as repairs finish up on the main jetty wharf conveyor system, now back in action after five months. The conveyor was rendered inoperable by June’s monster storm event, necessitating the chip mill to downsize operations and dispatch only smaller loads via the multi-purpose wharf. On Monday, the first full …

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New economic era for East Gippsland

The call by the Auswest sawmill and Tim Bull for long term log contracts to be renewed (EGN/SRM 2 Nov) is a misguided ‘Magic Pudding’ mindset, according to Environment East Gippsland. “Long term contracts are not being signed because there has been serious uncertainty of resource availability for quite a while”, said Jill Redwood from …

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The plan to prepare plans – the end is nigh

Having a list of rare and endangered species is not much good if there is no binding plan to protect them. As a result of the legal proceedings initiated in the Supreme Court on 21 May 2013 by EDO on behalf of EEG, the then environment Department, DEPI, agreed to immediately prepare protection plans called …

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Liberals’ environment policy has gone AWOL

It’s hard to believe it’s been almost been 10 years to the day since the Victorian Liberals had a comprehensive environment policy. While that might sound ridiculous in the context of global warming and other environmental woes, the sad reality is that an entire decade has passed since the state Liberals offered voters a detailed vision to tackle …

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