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Tasmanian World Heritage delisting - an Abbomination


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Tony Tony Tony

Turns out Tony is 85% incorrect that the 74,000 hectares he wants to delist is heavily logged or plantation. In fact the plantation he refers to is about the size of your front yard.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-26/tony-abbott-tasmanian-wilderness-claim-does-not-check-out/5345072

When asked for data supporting the delisting no evidence on the condition of the land in question was provided.

Does that now qualify as a lie. Yes. I think most Australians would see this as a straightforward lie to mislead the Australian people. I would hate to think that the heritage body would accept his rational for delisting if it relies on the area being degraded and plantation.

It has been suggested that this is merely divide and conquer style politics. Stir up the greenies and watch them buzz around. I will be interested to see how many further questions are asked and if he repeats his clearly false comments again in the future.

He has certainly cemented my loathing for conservative politics in Australia. Maybe that was the intended outcome, he certainly isn't governing for all Australians.

I think Abbomination is a very apt catch line for a man that is so fond of sound bites.

Edited by Briz Vegas
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If I remember correctly this is the first time a developed country has requested a World Heritage delisting.

The new govt is certainly hitting the ground running with environmental vandalism. The Great Barrier Reef and Tasmanian forests, not a bad start.

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I'm not against forestry, I think there's a sustainable demand for quality timber products, in the many forms that they take. 

 

I'm not understanding why that can't be managed in way that creates a continuous loop of logging, regeneration, and eventual re-logging again. Then again, I'm not overly knowledgable in either the chopping down or the growing of such trees. 

 

But I'm not favourable of excising World Heritage areas. As I get older, I'm leaning more towards the preservation of things for our children. If you get a toe in on something like this, how far will the door be forced open?

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There's only one environmental problem and that's the rogue species that has gone out of control, mining the future like there's no tomorrow.

Guess which species it is ?   Fiddling about at the edges of the problem with heritage listings and the like is about as useful as rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic - the iceberg's still out there and in the way.

But the behaviour of the rogue species is completely 'natural' - all species exploit the resources of their environmental niche until the resources won't support the population and then the numbers crash. 

There's nothing 'sustainable' in nature - nature is dynamic and ever-changing.

As long as people keep cranking out babies and wanting more and more toys the destruction of the natural world will continue.

There are those that argue that technology will save the day and they may be correct but I doubt it. And there's plenty of paradoxes out there. For example, people in industrialised societies are exposed to all sorts of contaminants yet have long life expectancies, and although the enviro-moaners have been preaching doom for years now it hasn't happened yet.

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There's only one environmental problem and that's the rogue species that has gone out of control, mining the future like there's no tomorrow.

Guess which species it is ?   Fiddling about at the edges of the problem with heritage listings and the like is about as useful as rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic - the iceberg's still out there and in the way.

But the behaviour of the rogue species is completely 'natural' - all species exploit the resources of their environmental niche until the resources won't support the population and then the numbers crash. 

There's nothing 'sustainable' in nature - nature is dynamic and ever-changing.

As long as people keep cranking out babies and wanting more and more toys the destruction of the natural world will continue.

There are those that argue that technology will save the day and they may be correct but I doubt it. And there's plenty of paradoxes out there. For example, people in industrialised societies are exposed to all sorts of contaminants yet have long life expectancies, and although the enviro-moaners have been preaching doom for years now it hasn't happened yet.

1. There's too many bloody people.  A topic for a new thread.

 

2. Even after chopping down most of the trees since colonisation apparently there is still "too much 'unproductive' forest".

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1. There's too many bloody people.  A topic for a new thread.

 

2. Even after chopping down most of the trees since colonisation apparently there is still "too much 'unproductive' forest".

Agreed. I can't believe how many bludging trees we have to put up with. All they do is soak up carbon dioxide and produce oxygen, surely they can do more and start pulling their weight.
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As a user of timber products in my day job occasionally, I'd be real happy if the only timber I could access was plantation timber and recycled timber.

 

Across the 'Pine Belt' which is the northern frigid areas, from Vladivostok to Helsinki to Vancouver...you get the picture. There are more trees now than at the turn of 20th century and this is because of plantation timber logged on a rotation basis. The Norwegians have something ridiculous like more than 35% more or something like that figure in harvestable timber than they had 50 years ago and it's all through good management and sustainable practices: Quick growing trees, grown in a quick way is how I saw it trumpeted on a documentary.

 

They are not cutting down their old Arctic pines or whatever, not dropping f/ing 500 year old plus old growth trees under the spurious claim that under canopy species will proliferate and grow bloody quickly to millable timber and we will leave these pockets of old growth and harvest around them and...yeah well you've seen/read the apologists for this kind of vandalism.

 

I've always disliked Tories and I've never got into the "hate you/hate them" wars but gee whiz Abbott and his reductive cronies are certainly making me think about hate politics.

 

It's like a bunch of primary school kids have been let into a high school and they're just running amok doing damage to year 12 kids stuff that has taken them years to produce.

 

A curse on him and his lackeys, gawd even Howard didn't seriously think about bringing imperial honours back in ffs.

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Hmm let's see - what do we need a diversion from -

 

Tas forests

Great barrier reef

asylum seekers

G. Pell

Trans-Pacific partnership

and the one I really like:

Axing the cost of providing the payments to about 1240 Department of Veterans' Affairs education allowance recipients is estimated at $260,000 in 2013-14. The payment was designed to help with unanticipated education expenses and is paid to the children of war veterans who have been injured or killed overseas.

 

 

- I think I've got just the thing

 

:) :) :) :)

 

Cheers

mick

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As a user of timber products in my day job occasionally, I'd be real happy if the only timber I could access was plantation timber and recycled timber.

 

Across the 'Pine Belt' which is the northern frigid areas, from Vladivostok to Helsinki to Vancouver...you get the picture. There are more trees now than at the turn of 20th century and this is because of plantation timber logged on a rotation basis. The Norwegians have something ridiculous like more than 35% more or something like that figure in harvestable timber than they had 50 years ago and it's all through good management and sustainable practices: Quick growing trees, grown in a quick way is how I saw it trumpeted on a documentary.

 

They are not cutting down their old Arctic pines or whatever, not dropping f/ing 500 year old plus old growth trees under the spurious claim that under canopy species will proliferate and grow bloody quickly to millable timber and we will leave these pockets of old growth and harvest around them and...yeah well you've seen/read the apologists for this kind of vandalism.

 

I've always disliked Tories and I've never got into the "hate you/hate them" wars but gee whiz Abbott and his reductive cronies are certainly making me think about hate politics.

 

It's like a bunch of primary school kids have been let into a high school and they're just running amok doing damage to year 12 kids stuff that has taken them years to produce.

 

A curse on him and his lackeys, gawd even Howard didn't seriously think about bringing imperial honours back in ffs.

Regrowth and plantation timber is OK for some structural use and in cheap disposable furniture.

If you want to make furniture that is beautiful,will last for generations and which is structurally stable you need old growth.

Do it once and do it properly.

The World Wildlife Fund promotes use of selectively logged old growth trees harvested in a sustainable manner.

They are right.

Decisions about which areas of forest can be sustainably logged and which areas are best preserved should be made by forestry scientists and environmental scientists.

Not by politicians,not by environmental activists,not by logging companies and certainly not by drawing out a big lump of land on a map and saying that will do.

Tasmania has the chance to get the balance right this time.If well intended but ignorant people can just butt out.

Edited by THOMO
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Just how do you harvest an old growth tree and make it sustainable? Place chainsaw at base of butt, cut,fell,mill. I don't see anything sustainable about that.

We must be making untold hundreds of thousands of pieces of fine furniture then if we need to log old growth forests for furniture construction.

 

Most of the old growth forests timber I saw logged up here before the practice was banned, went into flooring and construction/building grade lumber.

Cabinet timber plantations have been planted here over the past three decades and apart from Hoop pine, nothings really come of it sadly but they still do good research on it at the local UNI. Most millable native timber here is now turned into ply products locally.

 

Old growth forests are the only place you can get commercial quantities of several species and after it's cut down, there is a wait of a few hundred years to get some new ones. I don't understand the reasoning at all.

Laminated pine at building grade standard, supplies so much of the structural timber needs in today's houses with the display timbers like 4 x4 5 x 5 ect and display timber in decks and screens coming from overseas rainforest logging as we just don't have the hardwood any more to supply 4 b 4 posts and the like at affordable prices.

 

I disagree with the importation of S.E.Asian and Pacific island rainforest timber for domestic use and kwila or Merbau is and has been for some time now the timber of choice for veranda posts,hand railing, slats ect because it's affordable in comparison to local hardwood.

Take a look around any new housing estate and if there are hardwood posts then there is a real good chance it's kwila or merbau (same tree different name).

Hark back to the middle 70's through to the late 80's and all your window frames, all your skirting,architraves, your doors, your kitchens were all meranti...try buying that rainforest timber now, you wont, it's all logged out. Old growth forests gone for good.

 

So I'm in the lock it up for ever camp when it comes to old growth forests. Haven't even touched on hardwood woodchip milling.

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