Letters from Bob

Bob Loone

Trees are the tool Corporations use to attract money from investors. Plantations inflict serious economic and environmental impacts on small communities. However the central, more subtle, long term disaster is the Federal Government sponsored, taxpayer subsidised transfer, of the Nation’s farms, from local private ownership to impersonal absentee Corporations. We are witnessing, whether we are aware of it or not, a natinal ongoing disaster which denies future farmers access to either the land or the wealth it can produce.

A national disaster

PLANTATIONS impose many serious negative impacts on our local economy and community; it is an industry which Australian Corporations use cleverly to lure investors into minimising their tax.

For their money the investor is leased land at an exorbitant price, with virtually no control over its management, these lease charges show a high profit for the Corporation.

Much of this is used to finance the purchase of more farmland for the Corporation to lease to the next tax driven investor, and so it rolls on.

This “management” of $1.4Billion last financial year of taxpayer subsidised “Plantation investments” financially advantages Corporations, to outbid genuine farmers or private buyers for agricultural land.

Present and future farmers are denied the possibility of purchasing a farm, for more profitable purposes.

Tax driven “Plantation Corporations” use inequitable Federal Government policies to promote ‘Managed Investment Schemes’ (MIS). They transfer the ownership of good farmland from local farming families to corporations open to multinational takeover.

Trees are the tool Corporations use to attract money from investors. Plantations inflict serious economic and environmental impacts on small communities.

However the central, more subtle, long term disaster is the Federal Government sponsored, taxpayer subsidised transfer, of the Nation’s farms, from local private ownership to impersonal absentee Corporations.

We are witnessing, whether we are aware of it or not, a national ongoing disaster, which denies future farmers access to either the land or the wealth it can produce.

Should the woodchip industry collapse, what is the value of farmland when covered with nearly worthless trees? The financiers of a Pulp Mill and shareholders of these companies will not be able to afford the costs of clearance for the land will have lost its value.

Will the asset backing of the Corporation be able to sustain the double whammy of unsustainable, slow growing trees, and low pulp prices? Will our Federal government have the courage to demand economic accountability for taxpayer subsidised MIS or withdraw their tax free market forces distorting status.

The sayings of Senator Abetz

In an article in The Mercury May 30 2006 page 2 featuring the sayings of Senator Eric Abetz the word sustainable or sustainability appears six times.

Is this emphasis on these words due to the fact that plantation forestry in Tasmania is NOT sustainable? I am an agriculturalist with long experience in forestry matters spread over 50 years. I have travelled the state many times always taking special interest in the health of plantations and assessing their growth rates.

For those with experience it’s easy to recognise unsustainable practices. By far the majority of plantations in Tasmania are growing slower and slower as the nutrients are depleted. Generally Tasmanian soils are not fertile enough to sustain intensive plantation forestry.

In the interests of honesty and integrity I am duty bound to inform the public that intensive forestry, especially plantation forestry, as it is presently conducted in Tasmania is NOT sustainable.

Most soils in Tasmania will hardly produce one crop of plantation trees. If sustainable means being able to continue production indefinitely without destroying the resource, there is no way in general terms plantation forestry in Tasmania can make that claim.

In order to try and obtain two or three crops from the land, tax deductible driven plantation Investment companies are purchasing and closing down good highly productive family farms, this in turn destroys jobs, and diminishes the state’s economic activity.

They are inflating the price of farmland beyond the reach of our present and future farmers. Plantation forestry impacts heavily on the viability of nearby farmers by increasing their costs, lowering their income, and increasing their health risks. I am happy to explain these impacts in detail. Also there are the toxins released by forestry burns into the air we breathe, and the poisonous chemical sprays which end up in the water we drink, not to mention the environmental destruction.

By continuing to claim clear felling and plantation forestry is sustainable in Tasmania when clearly it isn’t, may fool the people, but it won’t fool nature. As the trees grow slower and slower, the soil becomes poorer, and the cost of the necessary fertiliser to restore soil fertility makes its use unviable.

I would like the opportunity to show Mr Abetz how unsustainable the present methods of forestry in Tasmania are, and how forestry is putting sustainable sections of our economy in jeopardy.

Nature is showing us plantation forestry in Tasmania is unsustainable, we would do well to take note, and not continue to try and fool ourselves.

Bob Loone
President
Western Rivers Preservation Trust