Public meetings in Bellingen on Sunday June 3 and Coffs Harbour on June 14 will be told state forests in these regions will be hardest hit by the NSW government’s proposals to modify logging regulations.
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Conservationists say the changes will allow intensified clearfelling and open up for harvesting areas of forest that have been off-limits for 20 years.
The North Coast Environment Council has accused the government of trying to keep the public in the dark about its proposals to increase logging intensity, zone 140,000 hectares for clearfelling, remove the need to look for and protect most threatened species before logging, reduce stream buffers and open up old growth forest for logging.
Ashley Love from the Bellingen Environment Centre said the government’s proposed intensive harvesting zone between Taree and Grafton is heavily centred on the Coffs Harbour and Bellingen regions.
“The proposals allow for clearfelling of coastal forests in individual clearings of up to 45 hectares,” Mr Love said.
“Clearfelling in the intensive coastal zone each year will extend to over 3000 football fields per year and will absolutely devastate our beautiful and unique coastal forests.”
The Bellingen Environment Centre says the aim is to convert the attractive and biological rich mixed aged forests into equivalent of blackbutt plantations.
“What we are seeing in the plantations of the Bellinger Valley such as at Tarkeeth State Forest would become standard fare for most of our forests.
“The government also proposes to wind back protection for old growth forest. The recognition of the need for protection of old growth forest goes back to the late 1980s when a national inquiry by the federal government found they were irreplaceable and should be protected.
“Forestry interests have never fully accepted protection measures for old growth forests and this is the most serious attack on these unique forests in almost twenty years. Local examples given in the Natural Resources Commission’s reports shows 88 per cent reduction of the old growth in Clouds Creek State Forest and 100 per cent removal in Wild Cattle Creek State Forest.
“The old growth designation of these areas will be wiped away at the stroke of a pen and the areas made potentially available for logging.
“Rainforest protection goes back even further in NSW with protection first introduced in 1979. It is extremely disappointing that after almost 40 years of protection the Natural Resource Commission is floating a process that could reduce by 30 per cent protected rainforest in state forests.
“With the NSW government not conducting any public consultation sessions on the proposals, the only way the community can find out about these and other proposals to strip further timber from our local forests is to attend the meetings.”
Public meetings are being held in Port Macquarie, Bellingen (Memorial Hall, June 3, 3pm), Coffs Harbour (Cavanbah Centre June 14, 6.30pm), Lismore, Kyogle, Byron Bay, Murwillumbah and Nimbin.
Forestry NSW and the Environment Protection Agency were approached for comment.
