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Tiwi Island wood chips
Way off the mental radar of most Australians are the Tiwi Island, administered by the Northern Territory. Unbeknownst to me, some pretty heavy going hardwood forest clearance has been going on here for the last 7 years. ABC Radio will feature this in its upcoming episode of Background Briefing (Sunday 16 Sept, 9am)
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/backgroundbriefing/stories/2007/2031767.htm
Great Southern Plantations, which has taken over the clearance on the islands, is wanting to expand its project to 80,000 hectares. The "Tiwi Red" Eucalypt is sent overseas for furniture and flooring. According to NAFI, this is the marketing name for Darwin stringybark, northern woollybutt, and Melville Island bloodwood. North Australian markets exist for Darwin Stringbark - it is popular for electricity poles, structural framing, and strip flooring. There are no restrictions on its export. The land is then replanted with a wattle that will be exported for paper-making.
Some of the proceeds from the clearances are being used to fund a school for 150 children, 28 locals had been employed (figure from late 2006), and the company is interested in sponsoring a local footy team.
According to the Northern Australian Environment Alliance, the company has been trying to secure their clearance plans with the traditional owners of the land. This indigenous land trust has also been in the news recently, having received a visit from Indigenous Affairs minister Mal Brough. They had agreed to sign over their head lease to the government for 99 years.
NAEA
Great Southern Plantations with Tiwi "Fact Sheet"
Google earth has high resolution images of the island showing the clearances.
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/backgroundbriefing/stories/2007/2031767.htm
Great Southern Plantations, which has taken over the clearance on the islands, is wanting to expand its project to 80,000 hectares. The "Tiwi Red" Eucalypt is sent overseas for furniture and flooring. According to NAFI, this is the marketing name for Darwin stringybark, northern woollybutt, and Melville Island bloodwood. North Australian markets exist for Darwin Stringbark - it is popular for electricity poles, structural framing, and strip flooring. There are no restrictions on its export. The land is then replanted with a wattle that will be exported for paper-making.
Some of the proceeds from the clearances are being used to fund a school for 150 children, 28 locals had been employed (figure from late 2006), and the company is interested in sponsoring a local footy team.
According to the Northern Australian Environment Alliance, the company has been trying to secure their clearance plans with the traditional owners of the land. This indigenous land trust has also been in the news recently, having received a visit from Indigenous Affairs minister Mal Brough. They had agreed to sign over their head lease to the government for 99 years.
NAEA
Great Southern Plantations with Tiwi "Fact Sheet"
Google earth has high resolution images of the island showing the clearances.
Comments
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Just love the koochy cheek kissing in front of neat rows of plantation saplings on the Great Southern Plantations website. No mention of the forest clearing that preceeded the plantations of course. That timber is beautiful high quality rot resistant dead straight grained and probably quite capable of being sustainably managed. But no,chop it all down and plant rows. Never mind the ecology of the living forests that disappear with the trees.
Did anyone see some weeks back the Grand Designs show on the ABC featuring sustainably managed Finnish forest products that use thier slow growing pine species. And what about Gunns getting ready to throw in the towel over enviromental restrictions impacting on thier pulp mill when all they have to do is a bit of research on Swedish and Finnish pulp mills that use closed loop systems with not only no pollution but reuse of the byproducts af pulping. But no, Gunns would rather pump gigalitres of quite valuable toxic sludge into Bass Straight (dilluted with an appropriate amount of fresh water to make it fit the pollution per litre limits which achieves nothing but making the salt water even more acidic for marine life) or not build it at all. See mondays Australian business section for a posturing profile of Gunns chief executive blabbing on about how much money he is going to take overseas if he can't have it his way with the Tasmanian ecology. Never mind what cost to others let alone the enviroment. Dear God, some people are selfish in this country.
I also read in a recent 'Australian' news article that the Tory opposition in the UK is preparing a policy for a mandatory 80% reduction in green house gas production by 2050 in line with the recently mandated reductions by chancellor Merkel of Germany. Presumably Australia will play catch up after Howard has helped to save Indonesian rainforests and the Tiwi islands will play catch up when the Northern Territory becomes a state. -
Hi Simon,
thanks for that, I'm still playing catch up on the Gunns mill. I finally read The Monthly article by Flanagan only last weekend. Funny to see this website come up tops when you put "Gunns Tasmania" into Google: http://www.mcgunns.com/
THE MONTHLY : GUNNS
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