Susan Austin, Hobart
"The issue of old-growth forests has been dominating the political debate in Tasmania", the Wilderness Society's Geoff Law told 500 people who turned up to the University of Tasmania on August 3 to hear him debate Forestry Tasmania managing director Evan Rolley.
Speaking first, Law presented the numerous reasons why preservation of Tasmania's old-growth forests is an urgent priority, including the fact that Tasmania's old-growth forests play an important role in regulating water flows and their destruction leads to problems with water catchment areas. He mentioned a 2003 ANU report that discovered that old-growth forests such as the Styx store thousands of tonnes of carbon — much more than was previously thought.
Law condemned Forestry Tasmania's record of logging, stating that fewer than 20% of Tasmania's ancient Eucalypt giants are left, and half of these are threatened by logging. He opposed the trend of converting "over 10,000 hectares per year" of native forests to plantations.
"Trees don't live forever" was one of the arguments used by Evan Rolley in defending Forestry Tasmania's point of view.
While Rolley stated that the best examples of old-growth forest were protected by the Regional Forest Agreement, Law countered that "the RFA was basically a hoax and a sham, because the 400,000 hectares set aside was never wanted for logging and the industry gained $76 million from the federal government to pursue a land grant".
Law claimed that 30% of Tasmania's wilderness forests were under threat, and Tasmania was the only Australian state still clearing rainforest. Rolley claimed that Tasmania is protecting 86% of its wilderness forests.
While Rolley tried to argue that "woodchips are not the issue", Law pointed out that 80-90% of logging occurring in state forests is being used for woodchips.
Law stated that 4000 jobs were lost in downstream processing in the 10 years to 2000, arguing that currently "we have a lose-lose situation: we are losing the old growth and losing the jobs".
During question time, a woman asked Rolley if it was true that Forestry Tasmania was exempt from the normal provisions of the Freedom of Information Act, and Rolley responded by saying "no, we have replied to 86% of applications". He said that the remaining applications involved information relating to legal issues or commercial in-confidence material that was exempt from the FOI legislation.
Law said that Forestry Tasmania has only answered some applications voluntarily. Later, another audience member disproved Rolley's claim by reading out the clause whereby Forestry Tasmania is completely exempted from the FOI Act.
The use of 1080 pesticides was raised in discussion, with Rolley arguing that Forestry Tasmania has "taken seriously the objective of getting it out of the system ... by investing a quarter of a million dollars a year in research on alternatives, combined with halving its use over the last three years". Law stated that "23% of all poison used in Tasmania is used on state forests" and claimed it was wreaking horrible consequences on native wildlife.
At the end, Rolley washed his hands of the debate by saying that land-use is a political decision made by parliamentarians and is outside of Forestry Tasmania's control. Law, in summing up the Wilderness Society's position, appealed to the federal government to help out, saying that the state Labor government was "at best not listening, or at worst downright belligerent and using the issue to divide and rule".
From Green Left Weekly, August 11, 2004.
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