Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Forestry

Still Cattle in the Barmah Forest (Part 2)

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ON December 1, the first day of summer here in Australia, residents of the little town of Barmah in northwestern Victoria, drove cattle into their forest in defiance of a government ban.  The Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) has threatened legal action, but so far the cattle are still there.  The forest has historically been grazed and the Barmah locals believe this is important to reduce the fire risk. https://jennifermarohasy.com.dev.internet-thinking.com.au/blog/2008/12/cattle-still-in-the-forest/

Yesterday Police turned up to remove the cattle, residents turned up to protest, there was some mediation, some media interviews, and the Police left without any cattle – they couldn’t find them in the large forest.

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Complaint Against ABC Upheld

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Australia’s Independent Complaints Review Panel (ICRP) has upheld a complaint made against a segment on the 7.30 Report, titled “Pulp mill could taint catch: fishing industry”, broadcast on 5 June 2007 and later made available on ABC Online.   Read more here.

The Cult of Celebrity and Tasmanian Forestry

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THE public hysteria surrounding the proposed Tasmanian pulpmill shows that the logging of native forests remains one of Australia’s hottest environmental topics. This is surprising given that sustainable wood production is now permitted within just a net 6 per cent portion of the nation’s public forests, it is highly regulated, and it is regarded as among the best managed in the world. As an environmental threat, the government’s Australia State of the Forests Report, regards logging as insignificant.

Despite this, it has become politically incorrect to support native hardwood production as a sensible and responsible use of a naturally renewable resource. Those who do so are routinely vilified as I was last week when a letter I had published in The Age newspaper drew responses that scorned me as an “industry apologist trying to keep us in the dark ages” and a “spin doctor” who “relies on the public being fools”.

In the past, I have also been described as a “mouthpiece for the logging industry” or the “pro-logging lobby”, which is apparently “blind to the bigger picture of global crisis”. I have been called a “forest raper” and a “pro-logging, anti-life person”. Others believe I am “motivated by short term greed” and “headed towards my own demise”. I am apparently one of those “people who can chop, hunt, maim, kill, exploit, dominate and destroy in the name of progress and jobs” and I have been likened to “the captain of the Titanic refusing to believe that your enterprise is fatally flawed”.

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Cattle Still in the Barmah Forest

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ON Monday, the first day of summer here in Australia, residents of the little town of Barmah in northwestern Victoria, drove cattle into their forest in defiance of a government ban.  The Department of Sustainability and Environment has threatened legal action, but so far the cattle are still there.

The forest has historically been grazed and the Barmah locals believe this is important to reduce the fire risk. 

[Read more…] about Cattle Still in the Barmah Forest