The Victorian government this week took the unusual step of buying the Australian Sustainable Hardwoods mill in Heyfield, east Gippsland. The reality of our times is one in which many firms in many industries face uncertain and perilous futures. The role of government is to ensure the necessary corrections and support needed by the economy …
The Victorian government’s decision to appropriate a large undisclosed sum of taxpayers’ money to buy a struggling timber mill nobody else wanted to acquire appears more driven by dubious politics than by rigorous public policy. The government has not revealed how much it has agreed to pay Australian Sustainable Hardwood for the mill in Heyfield, …
The Victorian Government has struck a deal to keep open Australia’s largest hardwood sawmill, at Heyfield in Victoria’s east, but workers are warning up to 20 contractors could be out of work in weeks. The mill’s operator, Australian Sustainable Hardwoods (ASH), had been locked in a dispute with the Government and state-owned logging company VicForests …
A dead koala has been found between fallen trees in a logged forest that the Andrews government could have protected – had it not ignored advice from its own scientific committee. The Sunday Age has obtained graphic images of the lifeless animal slumped over branches in the Acheron Valley north of Warburton, in a confronting example …
Throwing forests into furnaces to supposedly help our climate has been the dream of the native forest logging industry for years. First our governments and the CEFC are coal-captured and now logger-captured. No. It’s definately NOT carbon neutral. A shame this story repeated the lie that burning forests reduces emissions. It is in fact THREE …
Background Greater Glider populations are suffering across Australia. This is especially so in Victoria where populations in the Central Highlands and East Gippsland are in distress due to – among other reasons – fire and logging eating away at their habitat. The Greater Glider was listed as ‘vulnerable’ under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation …
Victoria’s Environment Department urged the Environment Minister not to follow the advice of Government scientists to issue a conservation order to protect the Great Glider and instead recommended discussions with the state logging agency for ‘voluntary action’, documents reveal. The documents released under Freedom of Information show the government’s Scientific Advisory Committee wrote to Minister …
Those who know the greater glider have a vivid way of describing it: like a flying possum crossed with a koala. About the size of a garden-variety possum, but with a looped tail up to 60 centimetres long and membranes that extend from its elbow to its ankle, it is Australia’s largest gliding marsupial. Scientists say it …
Introduced cats and foxes are finding native animals easily exposed by a loss of habitat due to fire and it is pushing some species to extinction. Research using infrared cameras and GPS trackers is showing the feral animals cover more ground in greater numbers after fires and their diet includes more native species. Bronwyn Hradsky …
VicForests has been caught out using very dodgy arithmetic to blame the small endangered Leadbeaters possum for its predicament. These were presented to the VEAC investigation and the Parliamentary enquiry as kosher – and too complicated for the average Joe to understand. But their bamboozling tactics didn’t fool Greens MP Samantha Dunn. VicForests is exposed …
