Cansdell and NEFA at loggerheads

Clarence Nationals MP Steve Cansdell has denied a claim by the North East Forest Alliance that he wants to open up National Parks for logging to satisfy an over-allocation of resources in Wood Supply Agreements.

NEFA’s Dailan Pugh said that during a tour of Doubleduke State Forest on Saturday Mr Cansdell told him opening up National Parks for logging was his personal preference for solving the shortfall in timber, however, Mr Cansdell refutes this.

In an interview on ABC North Coast Radio on Tuesday, Mr Cansdell stated, “This is myself talking here, I really think there should be a review of some of the areas that have been locked up and before had good protection and were suitably logged so that environments were protected and I really think there has been an overreaction by Green groups and overreaction from Labor governments more chasing preferences than environmental outcomes.”

Mr Pugh also claims that Mr Cansdell supported NEFA’s call for an independent public inquiry into the over-allocation of timber in north-east NSW, but Mr Cansdell said while he definitely supports an inquiry, it should be conducted by Forests NSW officers and Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water regulators.

It seems the pair do agree that the NSW Government over committed when it signed Wood Supply Agreements in 2004. Mr Pugh says the NSW Government ignored the concerns of Forests NSW, which identified that their own assessments of yields in north-east NSW were flawed. He claims they also removed clauses from the Wood Supply Agreements that allowed committed volumes to be reduced in line with yield reviews.

“The NSW Government ignored these concerns when it issued tradeable and compensational Wood Supply Agreements of 215,422m3 of large quota sawlogs per annum for 20 years from north-east NSW until 2023,” Mr Pugh said. “This was despite Forests NSW’s latest ‘indicative’ yield review at that time identifying that yields should be limited to 187,000m3 per annum for five years and then reduced to 170,000m3 per annum for years six to 20.”

Mr Cansdell and Mr Pugh both agree the situation has forced Forests NSW to begin logging smaller logs in local plantations but again they disagree with the ramifications. Mr Cansdell doesn’t see this as a problem, saying it creates new young growth to support wildlife, while Mr Pugh says it will hurt plantations and reduce yields in the long-term.

Mr Pugh said Forests NSW has had to compensate mills that couldn’t meet supply commitments and said the current desperation for sawlogs is leading to the unlawful logging of native forests. He said timber quotas need to be urgently reduced.

“With yields declining and native forest operations operating at a loss to $8-14.5 million per annum the situation will now worsen rapidly,” he said.

However, Mr Cansdell believes it is only a matter of years before there are enough plantations with adequate timber to meet the NSW Government’s Wood Supply Agreements.

“It’s going to ease when these plantations come on board in the next few years and the supply for the demand is there,” he said. “Quotas can be met through plantations, through native forest plantations, and I think we have 7000 hectares or something in the North Coast. Many of those plantations will be coming on line in the next five years.

“What we need to encourage is the development of ecologically sustainable forestry management on private land… they can be sustainably selectively logged, as has happened in the past, and we support that.

“Bob Carr locked up too many National Parks… he wanted to lock up National Parks quick so that could be his legacy, but it should have been done in a phased-in manner, not rushed as it was, which has put pressure on state forests with these over allocations.”

For an in depth about local logging, check out Liina Flynn’s investigative piece in next week’s Echo.