Media Release 13 January 2012
Environment groups said the conservation agreement released today by the Tasmanian and Commonwealth governments did not adequately deliver the first key conservation outcome of the Tasmanian Forests Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA) and urged them to end logging in these unique and important forests.
“The Tasmanian and Commonwealth Governments have allowed logging to continue in ancient, wilderness forests that the Premier and Prime Minister agreed would be immediately protected,” [1] said Environment Tasmania Director, Dr Phill Pullinger.
“The IGA has stumbled at its first conservation hurdle,” said Wilderness Society Tasmanian Campaign Manager Vica Bayley. “This has severely shaken the confidence of environment groups. The Agreement clearly states that logging will be ended in high conservation value forest areas whilst those forests are assessed. The Governments have failed to invoke the compensation clause.”
“Today we should be celebrating an historic milestone that protects rainforests, ancient giants and critical habitat for endangered species like the Tassie devil, but instead governments have accepted Forestry Tasmania’s business-as-usual logging in iconic forests like the Weld and Picton Valleys and Ben Lomond. Conflict in the forests and instability in markets are the inevitable result if governments will not deliver conservation outcomes as agreed.”
Dr Pullinger said, “Forestry Tasmania is running amok - logging in ancient forests that the Premier and Prime Minister agreed would be immediately protected [1],” said Environment Tasmania Director, Dr Phill Pullinger; "If the governments want this conflict solved they need to urgently pull Forestry Tasmania into line."
“Forestry Tasmania has scheduled road building in highly contentious areas such as the Weld Valley, meaning conservation values are being damaged instead of being protected. ” said Dr Pullinger.
“It is not too late to fix this,” said Australian Conservation Foundation CEO Don Henry.
“We urge the two Governments to ensure Forestry Tasmania assists implementation of the agreement and delivers meaningful forest protection that meets the terms of the IGA and the expectations of the broader community. We urge them to further examine the proposed logging coupes and end logging in these unique and important forests.”
The protection of these forests is a corner stone of the agreement. It is time for both Governments to show leadership and deliver on their commitment, concluded The Wilderness Society, Environment Tasmania and Australian Conservation Foundation.
Contacts: Vica Bayley, The Wilderness Society, 0400 644 939
Dr Phill Pullinger, Environment Tasmania, 0428 554 934
Josh Meadows, ACF media adviser, 0439 342 992
1. Clause 25 of the IGA, signed in August 2011 States that “The State will immediately place the 430,000 hectares of native forest identified in Attachment A … into Informal Reserves,” whilst clause 36 states that “Prior to formal legislative protection of the areas of reserve identified in Clause 29, and until completion of the independent verification process in accordance with clause 20, the 430,000 hectares referred to in Clause 25 will be protected under a Conservation Agreement…” The clear intention of clause 36 is that the forests will have continuous legal protection until the delivery of formal legislative protection.
Map of Coupes Excluded from the Conservation Agreement
Google Earth - Coupes in Conservaton Agreement Download
This is a Google Earth file. If you have Google Earth installed on your computer than it can be opened inside Google Earth to see the coupes that have been allowed to be logged within the Conservation Agreement.
The coupes shown in this file are in some cases of a different size to that published in the conservation agreement. This is most likely the result of planning decisions taken after the initial maps were developed and published in FT's online coupe maps. Because of this where there is a significant discrepancy between the coupe size in the conservation agreement and the Google Earth boundary the layer should only be considered an indicative guide of the location. You can see the details of each coupe by clicking on the coupe.
Note that there are some coupes that were not included in the conservation agreement but are within the Land covered by the agreement if the area covered was less than 25% of the coupe.