Forestry

A Christmas tree grown by Forestry Corporation of NSW proudly sits in Government House in the centre of Sydney as a visual reminder of the forestry industry and the value it provides.

Jack Bradshaw. Exposing the hypocrisy of the WA government in banning sustainable timber harvesting in native forest but supporting the strip mining of the same forest.

Recent catastrophic bushfires and reports of threats to species have highlighted concerns about the management of Australia’s forests. Most prominently, there are increasing concerns that forest management is failing to ensure forest health, build ecosystem resilience and protect threatened species. These concerns are real, but the key drivers are not well understood. A body of opinion and media coverage often presents timber harvesting as the primary threat to forest ecosystems and suggests that creating more national parks will protect threatened species and habitats and reduce the risk of severe bushfires. Yet the situation is far more complex.

Dr Canadell said in response to my comment: “Our study doesn’t discuss forest management.” This statement is Not True ... Dr Canadell and his colleagues failed to consider critical evidence which demolishes the CSIRO argument.

New research by CSIRO, Australia’s national science agency, shows climate change has driven a significant increase in Australia’s forest fire activity over the last three decades. A lengthening of the fire season towards Autumn and Winter were also identified, along with an increase in fire activity in cooler and warmer regions including alpine forests in Tasmania and tropical rainforests in Queensland.

WA Forestry Minister Dave Kelly has announced that the McGowan Government has made an additional 12,000 tonnes of structural pine available over the next three months for the Western Australian timber manufacturing industry and the State's building and construction sector ... In the past, the WA softwood processing industry supplied approximately 65 per cent of pine products to the State's housing and construction market. The remaining demand has been met by timber imported from the Eastern States or overseas.  

The professional association for forest scientists, growers and managers in Australia has expressed its concern at the escalating Victorian forest wars, saying changes are desperately needed in the way the State’s forests are managed. Forestry Australia Vice President Dr Michelle Freeman said the escalating situation in Victoria shows the State’s current approach to forest management is simply not working.

Peter Rutherford. This photo essay may provide a different perspective on the questions as to whether we burn and if we do burn, how often. Perhaps the relevant question is not whether we burn but how do we burn.

The whole landscape needs maintenance by mild fire. But academics and fire chiefs talk of asset protection zones, strategic zones and management zones with different fire regimes. They just don’t get it. Firebreaks don’t work in extreme weather. They can’t stop firestorms and long-distance ember showers. If you need to reduce accumulated fuel, you haven’t been maintaining the landscape properly.

Peter Rutherford. The Sydney Morning Herald, the Age and other outlets published an article regarding a freedom of information (FOI) request lodged by the South East Timber Association on 28 April 2021. The initial request was for emails and letters between Professor David Lindenmayer and 17 journalists and 4 other parties ... It is flattering that the named journalists and Professor Lindenmayer are so overwhelmed by the FOI request that they have made a national news story. As every single exchange between the Professor and the journalists has been redacted, what is the point of the story?

Renewable energy and renewable timber may soon be produced side-by-side, with the passage today of legislation to enable clean energy developments such as wind energy to be established in State forest pine plantations. NSW Parliament passed amendments to the Forestry Act 2012 as part of the Energy Legislation Amendment Bill to facilitate the opportunity to establish renewable energy infrastructure in State forest pine plantations.

Forestry Corporation put 40 new firefighting recruits through their paces at its Tumbarumba training camp in preparation for the fire season ahead ... This included topics such as fire behaviour, tactics and strategy, leadership, command, control and communications, and how to operate the range of appliances and equipment used at fires, said Fire Training and Operations Officer, Adrien Thompson.

Peter Rutherford, SETA. ... evidence that the three dimensional fuel loads, which have become the norm in much of the NSW forested landscape, are an artefact of over 200 years of fire management neglect and are not representative of the of up to 60,000 years of evolution, shaped by the intelligent use of fire in the Australian landscape.

Preparations for the upcoming bushfire season are well advanced, with more than 150 people taking part in a multi-agency pre-season briefing in Launceston ... This year, a total of 217 fuel reduction burns treating over 32,000 hectares have to date been completed, and a successful “Red Hot Tips” Program has also supported farmers and large landholders to conduct 229 burns covering over 5,300 hectares.

A new study  has found that Alnus trees in agroforestry systems significantly contribute to capturing and storing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Researchers discovered that the fast-growing Alnus tree, common in most Rwandan households, capture substantial amounts of carbon in aboveground biomass—live or dead matter from trees—with amounts varying depending on the age and elevation of the tree.

The bulk of this commentary has little to do with the content of the Report to the NSW Natural Resources Commission. The report addresses the consequences of the 2019/20 fires for the objectives and outcomes of the Coastal Integrated Forestry Operations Approvals (i.e. forest health, threatened species conservation, water quality and aquatic biodiversity). The 2019/20 fires have rendered forests, in relation to these objectives and outcomes, in a highly vulnerable state because of their magnitude and severity. This vulnerability will be ongoing and challenging to deal with because the efficacy of all facets of fire management (e.g. preparation, prevention, suppression) will be adversely affected by climate change.

With just two days’ notice, community volunteers at the heart of the Koondrook Perricoota co-design welcomed a shiny entourage of politicians, bureaucrats and media. The whistlestop tour was part of a $330 million funding announcement with no less than five state and federal politicians ... The Koondrook Perricoota project has been a white elephant of government spending with the $120 million over-designed project sitting idle.

People proliferated across Australia, which was then a part of Sahul, from about 40 000 years ago when megafauna finally disappeared long before the Last Glacial Maximum. Aboriginal burning initially turned much biomass into charcoal, reducing browse, changing vegetation and causing megafaunal extinctions. It created ecosystems whose health and safety depend on constant human input of mild fire.

The Tasmanian Government welcomes the announcement by the Federal Government to help grow and incentivise the plantation estate and support jobs in Tasmania ... unlocking the carbon farming market ‘water rule’ in the South of the State will help encourage private forester participants to fully participate in the Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF) across the State, including making the market more accessible to small scale landholders.