By Raquel Mustillo
SOUTH Australia’s peak timber processors association has questioned why log exports out of the Port of Portland have continued amid a nationwide shortage of structural timber.
But OneFortyOne plantations and the Australian Forest Products Association say local mills are already running at full capacity, with customers continuing to receive sawlog despite high demand for the product.
Demand for sawlog – which is the wood that can be processed into beams, planks or components of timber frames – has skyrocketed across the globe, with the finished product fetching prices 350pc higher than the same time last year in some international markets.
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AFPA calls on native forestry critics to drop weapons and join battle against climate change
The Australian Forest Products Association (AFPA) says a landmark study into the Black Summer bushfires confirming timber harvesting operations do not increase bushfire severity, and that the biggest factor is climate change, is an opportunity for all sides of the native forestry debate to join together to fight the real threat to our native forests and threatened species.
The report, The severity and extent of the Australia 2019-20 Eucalyptus forest fires are not the legacy of forest management just published in the Nature Ecology and Evolution Journal, was authored by a team of researchers led by Professor David Bowman from the University of Tasmania. As Professor Bowman told The Conversation their research found forest harvesting, “had little, if any, effect on the Black Summer bushfires. Rather, the disaster’s huge extent and severity were more likely due to unprecedente
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Unanimous Federal Court decision a major win for Victorian hardwood timber industry
The full bench of the Federal Court has today delivered an historic win for Australia’s sustainable native forest industries by confirming that forestry operations covered by Regional Forest Agreements provide all the environmental protections required by national environmental laws.
In a unanimous decision, the Court upheld VicForests’ appeal against a single-judge decision 12 months ago which had created significant legal uncertainty for RFAs and for the tens of thousands of forest industry jobs that the bilateral state-Commonwealth agreements underpin.
At the heart of the appeal was whether the Commonwealth EPBC Act could apply to forestry operations covered by an RFA, or whether the RFAs provide an equivalent and alternative (as VicForests maintained) regulatory framework with Commonwealth oversight to protect “Matters of National Environmental Significance”. The Full bench
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More sustainable forest industries essential to meet global 2050 carbon neutrality goal, says new UN FAO Forestry Advisory Chair Newly installed Chair of ACSFI Ross Hampton.
The newly installed Chair of the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization’s (UN FAO) Advisory Committee on Sustainable Forest-based Industries (ACSFI), Ross Hampton, has made it clear that increasing sustainable forestry and timber industries is key to achieving the global ‘Carbon Neutral by 2050’ goal.
Mr Hampton, who is also Chief Executive Officer of the Australian Forest Products Association (AFPA) said, “The world is increasingly turning to renewable resources such as timber and fibre-based packaging to meet both sustainability and climate goals. This trend must be turbo charged if we are to meet the ambition of carbon neutrality by 2050.