The latest in a series of meetings will be
held in Grafton on Saturday June 30 to present the facts about what proposed changes
to logging rules in North Coast state forests will mean for wildlife and biodiversity.
Conservation groups are holding these meetings following
the State Government's failure to respond to public concerns beyond a bunch of
'motherhood' statements dispensed by local politicians, and the refusal by the
Environment Protection Authority (EPA) to visit north coast forests to see first hand the irreparable damage that
has resulted from 20 years of unbridled pillage.
The Regional Forests Agreements end in a few years,
and because state forests across the region have suffered from serious
over-logging to meet unrealistic wood supply contracts, the State Government is
trying to push through radical changes to find more timber.
They claim these changes will not result in net
changes to wood supply, or to erosion of environmental values. Their
explanation that this would be achievable through their buy-back of some supply
contracts, cannot be believed, because the real reason those contracts were
bought out was because there was no timber to fill them. Essentially NSW
taxpayers forked out hundreds of millions of dollars to buy out contracts for
timber that never existed.
However, to achieve their stated aim of no net change
to timber supply, the government now intends to allow the logging of previously
protected old-growth forest, by re-evaluating their old-growth status. So much
for no erosion of environmental values.
Buffer zones on headwater streams have also been
reduced from 10 metres to 5 metres, while removing most species-specific protections for
threatened species, including the need to look for Koalas. This will allow more
trees to be logged.
Possibly the worst plan is to increase logging
intensity throughout public forests, identifying over 50 State Forests on the
north coast where clear felling and/or double intensity logging will occur.
Continued logging of forests affected by dieback is also planned, a problem
that resulted from over logging in the first instance.
The Grafton meeting will be held upstairs in the
Grafton Services Club at 5 pm on Saturday June 30.
-John Edwards
