WHEN is an environment group no longer an environment group? Seems an odd question to ask in a rural paper, but stick with me. Planet Ark, famous for encouraging us to recycle greetings cards to save trees, is set to endorse clearfell logging of native forest. The Australian Forestry Standard – an alternative logging certification …
As part of the new Clean Energy Future Package, the Government has announced that it will provide funding of $946 million over the first six years for landholders to undertake projects that establish, restore, protect or manage biodiverse carbon stores. The Fund will support restoration and management of biodiverse carbon stores including:• reforestation and revegetation …
VicForests has again been given aid of almost $1.3 million to clean up degraded clearfelled public forests that should have been rehabilitated and paid for by VicForests years ago. “What other business has made a loss every year yet is rewarded by millions of dollars of tax payers money to keep going?” asked Jill Redwood …
Below is summary of an address given by Clive Hamilton in March 2011 in Melbourne. It gives a very astute overview of what we really need to do to bring about change.After almost 30 years of working at the forest campaign, and still seeing our remnants of magnificent old growth forest turned into a brew …
THE Ombudsman has been asked to investigate VicForests for allowing thousands of tonnes of wood salvaged from the Black Saturday bushfires to be exported to China in breach of a government contract. The Wilderness Society has lodged a complaint with Ombudsman George Brouwer after VicForests confirmed a private company, Pinex Logging, had breached a contract …
TWS Vic and MyEnvironment Inc. have played private eye for the last 12 weeks to study a supply chain of logs that have been leaving our fire ravaged forest and ending up in Footscray. The forest were once home to the endangered faunal emblem of Vic – the Leadbeaters Possum. The supply chain is a …
The Green Carbon Report put out by the Australian National University shows that industrially managed forests only return to 60% of their original (undisturbed) carbon capacity if left to grow on. The carbon stock of forests subject to commercial logging, and of monoculture plantations in particular, will always be significantly less on average (~40 to …
The Australian public keeps changing its mind on climate change. No wonder our leaders don’t know where to step. Most Australians say they don’t want a carbon tax. So what do they want? After all, over the past year, Australians have transformed themselves from a citizenry worried about global warming, and asking for something to …
THE financial woes of the state government’s commercial forestry arm VicForests have deepened, with it forced to go back to Treasury for a bigger loan. VicForests’ line of credit with Treasury has doubled in three years, from $12.5 million in 2009 to $25 million this year, as the company struggles with cash-flow problems. The deepening …
Being such an environmentally sensitive logging agency, VicForests decided to do a bit of self promotion by claiming it had found a giant tree that it will save. Halleluiah. They claim the tree is the first to be protected under VicForests’ new Giant Tree Protection policy. Well, the DSE introduced this prescription in 2004! So …
