Help recovery of bushfire affected forests—review logging

The recent Inquiry into ecosystem decline in Victoria recognised the plight of native plants, animals and habitats, including after the 2019-20 bushfires, and the need for urgent conservation action including developing action plans (plans for recovery) for all threatened species with properly resourced implementation.

The Victorian government has six months to respond to the recommendations.

In the interim, Agriculture Minister Mary-Anne Thomas must reduce the pressure on these forests by reducing logging rates. It’s up to her how much of the state's public forests can be industrially clear felled—a practise that is destructive and outdated.

Australians rely ...

The recent Inquiry into ecosystem decline in Victoria recognised the plight of native plants, animals and habitats, including after the 2019-20 bushfires, and the need for urgent conservation action including developing action plans (plans for recovery) for all threatened species with properly resourced implementation.

The Victorian government has six months to respond to the recommendations.

In the interim, Agriculture Minister Mary-Anne Thomas must reduce the pressure on these forests by reducing logging rates. It’s up to her how much of the state's public forests can be industrially clear felled—a practise that is destructive and outdated.

Australians rely upon these forests for so many reasons—clean air to breathe and water to drink, weekends spent with family and friends getting away from it all, and the economy of local small businesses and cultural heritage. These forests are the life line for threatened species already on the brink of extinction which are worth so much more than the paper and packaging products the trees are wood chipped for.

Will you write to Mary-Anne Thomas, the Victorian Minister for Agriculture, asking her to implement an immediate review to reduce logging in Victoria’s public forests?

Image: Ben Baker

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Email Minister Thomas today!

Email Mary-Anne Thomas, the new Victorian Minister for Agriculture to review logging in Victoria’s surviving forests post 2019–2020 bushfires

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I am writing to congratulate you on being appointed Minister for Agriculture. In your first year as Minister for Agriculture, I’d like you to focus on an urgent matter: the need for immediate action to reduce logging in Victoria’s public forests.

In November 2019, I was pleased to hear that the Victorian government committed to a long overdue and common sense transition of logging from public native forests into plantations. Our forests were already on their knees and then, in the months following the announcement, the devastating Black Summer fires raged—changing everything. The fires scorched the landscape across eastern Victoria, burning more than three quarters of East Gippsland’s state forests. This follows decades of clear fell industrial logging that has robbed threatened species of vital habitat and now, the logging industry is moving into our state's most iconic public forests to satisfy wood pulp volumes.

Just like communities and nature, the Victorian government must adapt after the bushfires. This means immediately reviewing and reducing forest logging and tree extraction rates—including through your powers as Agriculture Minister under the Forests (Wood Pulp Agreement) Act 1996, and the Sustainable Forest (Timber) Act 2004. The need for a rapid transition to a sustainable industry that guarantees all Victorian’s futures must be fast tracked.

Our forests left standing are worth so much more to me and future generations than the paper and cardboard products they are felled to produce. Please reduce logging rates, to help provide hope for a future for our threatened species, a safe and secure water supply, people and nature based recreation and tourism, and protection of cultural values.

Minister, through the ongoing destruction and impacts from the fires, I’m asking you to act in the interest of the whole community, and future generations—as the elected representative with the power to reduce the volume of forests that are logged. Will you give the forests and the many communities they support across Victoria a chance to survive, and to thrive?

I urge you to choose these common sense solutions, and live up to the expectation of managing forests in the interests of the whole community. We’re at a crossroads, please choose a secure, safe and vibrant future.

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