Tag Archives: VicForests

Cruel blow for new national park and Leadbeater’s possums

A plan for a new national park to protect the endangered Leadbeater’s possum has been dealt a blow with revelations VicForests locked in millions of dollars worth of new logging contracts.  (The Age, Nov 15th)

Rather than Democracy, Corporatocracy – or the power of corporations- determines the fate of our own Victorian fauna Emblem.

The decision to set up a taskforce to strike a “consensus” followed pressure during the campaign from the Construction, Forestry, Mining and and Energy Union, which had threatened to campaign against Labor on concerns that ending logging in the area would threaten Gippsland jobs.  Threats against “jobs” is more important than small and seemingly insignificant fairy possums!

VicForests’ latest annual report suggests “ending logging before the 2018 election could be difficult”.  Their annual report shows they’ve negotiated various contracts to harvest and haul 900,000 cubic  metres of wood a year for the next three or four years!

The same State government can’t endorse a new national park, and also be the owner of VicForests.  It’s a contraction of terms, and a conflict of interests.  What this national park needs to protect is the ancient old-growth forest of Mountain Ash, and threatened native species, not  the “logging industry and jobs”!  Economic growth and jobs will eventually eat up all our natural resources!

What needs protecting can’t have the same owners that threaten to destroy it, for short-term monetary gain. Our State’s fauna emblem, the Leadbeater’s Possum, needs protection from the same State government that is threatening the park’s implementation.

The Victorian state government revealed long-awaited terms of reference for an industry taskforce, established to navigate the explosive battles between loggers and environmentalists over the state’s native forests.  The taskforce will investigate issues including protection of threatened species such as the Leadbeater’s possum, job protection and economic activity.

Logging, conservation of the possums, are in direct conflict.  How is this impossible task to be negotiated?  You can’t have the old growth forests intact, and also have them chopped down, with Leadbeater’s possums losing their only homes?  Opening up the canopy of the forest will make them more vulnerable to fires, then the problem of the pesky possums will be solved- “naturally”.   Their final demise, extinction, will solve this tricky problem. Native forests animals are a threat to job protection, and constrict economic activities!

Conservations and scientists — including David Attenborough — have long argued that the park is needed to protect the possum, which is believed to be perilously close to extinction.  Clearly, “conservation” of logging jobs has priority over the conservation of our native animals, even threatened ones.  They prefer the possums go extinct rather than have logging jobs threatened. The mighty dollar has enormous power to wield over these decision, and the Great Forest National Park would be a threat to incomes!

 

Corduroy_road_01_by_Pengo

(image:  Corduroy road built from native forest in the highly contested Gun Barrel logging coupe (297-526-0001), in Sylvia Creek Forest, north-east of Melbourne, in Victoria, Australia. This photo was taken on 13 September 2011, at which point logging had been banned here after the Victorian Supreme Court extended an injunction blocking the state-owned timber company, VicForests, from logging until at least February 2012, when the trial begins with MyEnvironment, a local environment organisation. The area is an important habitat for the endangered Leadbeater's possum, whose population was decimated by the Black Saturday bushfires in 2009.)

Lobby groups with vested interest in jobs, and logging, need to be given the chop!  The CFMEU want access to the forests for the benefit of their members.

This “blow” to the forest plan needs to be dealt with internally, from the State government.  The government’s position on logging in native forests is ambiguous, despite promising a special taskforce to examine the issue and help secure the long-term survival of Victoria’s iconic Leadbeater’s possum.

In Greek and Roman mythology, the Gordian knot was an extremely complicated knot tied by Gordius, the king of Phrygia in Asia Minor. Located in the city of Gordium, the knot came to symbolize a difficult problem that was almost impossible to solve.  Alexander the Great’s solution to the problem led to the saying, “cutting the Gordian knot,” which means solving a complicated problem through bold action.  The bold action needed in this case is to make the brave, courageous and glaringly obvious political decision – the implementation of the Great Forest National Park!  Not all groups can be appeased, especially if their aims are purely monetary and short-term.

You can’t have contradictory policies, and you can’t have your cake and eat it too!

 

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Environment group wins battle to protect habitat for threatened powerful, sooty, masked owls

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The Victorian Government has agreed to set aside 2,000 hectares of forest in East Gippsland to help protect three threatened species of owl.

An agreement was reached on Friday between Environment East Gippsland and the Victorian Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP) before the case was scheduled to appear in the Supreme Court.

SootyOwl(image: Sooty Owl)

Owls, gliders, frogs, bandicoots, potoroos and untold other species were wiped out in the 2009 Black Saturday inferno. It will take decades for the damage from this shockingly managed fire to start to recover. East Gippsland’s rare species that relied on the Snowy Park for refuge will now be under even greater threat and need all the help they can get.

Environment East Gippsland’s Jill Redwood said it was a “fairly significant” win for the threatened Sooty, Masked and Powerful Owls. The State government is responsible for the implementation of the Wildlife Act, and environmental protection laws, but they are the convicted eco-criminals here!

Brown Mountain’s remaining unprotected stands of 580ha (including a Powerful Owl nest site) to be included in a Special Protection Zone, including 185ha that was scheduled for VicForests logging.

When the law-enforcers end up as the law-breakers, the public must take action!

Click here to listen to Jill Redwood, Nathan Trushell and Nina Cullen.

The three key species of threatened forest owls that live in areas of Victorian State Forest that VicForests operate within are the Powerful Owl (Ninox strenua), Masked Owl (Tyto novaehollandiae novaehollandiae) and Sooty Owl (Tyto tenebricosa).

This 10 month case sought to enforce the state government’s obligations to protect 3 threatened owl species – the Sooty, Masked and Powerful Owls.

Environment East Gippsland argued that the government had failed to protect the legal minimum habitat for threatened owls, and that bushfires in 2014 destroyed large areas of protected owl habitat. Meanwhile, VicForests had plans to continue clearfelling unabated in areas where the rare owls survived.


“This agreement is one step in the right direction – but the most cost-effective way to protect threatened wildlife and avoid future legal disputes is to permanently protect their habitat, especially all remaining old growth forests in East Gippsland. The owls are just one of so many rare native animals in need of urgent protection. We hope to see the new Labor government works with the community to find win-win solutions, rather than paying out $5.5 million a year for VicForests to continue clearfelling critically important habitat”.

For comment: Jill Redwood – 5154 0145

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