BY ALEX BAINBRIDGE
& ANTHEA STUTTER
HOBART — The campaign to end the woodchipping of old-growth forests took a major step forward when thousands of people marched through the Styx Valley on July 13.
At last year's state election, it was clear that a majority of Tasmanians favoured saving old-growth forests. This was reflected in the record 20% vote for the Greens and by individual candidates from both the Labor and Liberal parties expressing support for the forests.
Liberal disarray resulted in the pro-logging Labor government being returned with an absolute majority of votes. Premier Jim Bacon arrogantly asserted that government policy would not change. Labor then ignored a January 1 deadline, imposed by the Tasmania Together community consultation process, to begin phasing out old-growth logging.
The July 13 march was the first major outpouring of public support for old-growth forests since then.
Forest campaigner and former Socialist Alliance candidate Glenn Shields expressed optimism: "If its possible to get 3000 people out there on a winter's day, then I now believe that a march the size of the Gordon-below-Franklin days is totally feasible [in Hobart]."
Organisers were overwhelmed by the larger than expected turnout. "I could tell as we left the northern suburbs of Hobart that it was going to be huge", Shields told Green Left Weekly. "It was just continuous streams of traffic all going in the one direction. Every sort of Tasmanian possible was there", said Shields, who ended up running a shuttle service to get people to the rally. He picked up one elderly woman who had just recovered from a broken leg, had walked 2.5 kilometres and was prepared to walk six to get to the rally. "There were people with small children in strollers walking five or six kilometres. I've never seen determination like that before."
The Styx Valley contains the tallest hardwood trees on Earth, according to the Wilderness Society. Many are taller than a 25-storey building, more than 400 years old and up to five-metres-wide at the base. The Styx forest is home to many native species of wildlife.
Between 300 and 600 hectares of the Styx Valley are logged each year. The ancient giant trees are often replaced with plantations of non-native species.
Neil Cremasco of the Huon Community Association told GLW that the "absolutely amazing trees" of the Styx "just have to be kept". "Economic modelling studies have proven the value of keeping those forests intact for a viable tourist industry yet the Tasmanian government and its supporters in big business are logging and clearfelling trees in that area instead."
"That's not surprising when you consider that the major parties in this state get huge electoral funding from the big end of town", Cremasco added.
"Forestry Tasmania and timber communities in Australia say that forests like the Styx have been logged for over 60 years. But what they're not telling us is that logging has now become incredibly automated — unlike the pioneer days... That's why jobs are lost in the woodchip industry and small family timber mills are being elbowed out."
Speakers at the July 13 rally included author Richard Flanagan, Greens senator Bob Brown and ABC gardening personality Peter Cundall. Cundall received huge applause when he accused the timber industry of being driven by "pure old-fashioned greed".
From Green Left Weekly, July 23, 2003.
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