Geoff Law Full text of Letter to the Editor, Sunday Tasmanian, 5 January 2007
First of all, the two major fires which Tasmania suffered — Wielangta and St Marys/Scamander — started on either private land or Forestry Tasmania land. Most of the country burnt was either private land or Forest Tasmania land. The areas concerned have therefore supposedly been subject to the sort of management advocated by Mr Felmingham or Senator Abetz for many decades. Each area has experienced significant hazard-reduction burning, logging and regeneration burning. Yet they burnt fiercely and uncontrollably.
Mr Felmingham uses most of his column-inches to push the case for regeneration burning in logged oldgrowth forests. He says that such burns ‘remove much of the debris in a forest’. He fails to mention that most of that debris is there because the forest was logged! His argument therefore reduces to ‘we must log therefore we must burn’.
BRUCE Felmingham (31 December 2006) departs from his area of expertise in economics to give us a lecture on the issue of fires. He misleadingly characterises the debate as one of ‘to burn or not to burn?’ and then contradicts himself by implying that 99% of Tasmanians do accept some level of burning.
Like the Forestry and ‘Conservation’ Minister, Eric Abetz, he seems impervious to the facts and slightly muddled.
First of all, the two major fires which Tasmania suffered — Wielangta and St Marys/Scamander — started on either private land or Forestry Tasmania land. Most of the country burnt was either private land or Forest Tasmania land. The areas concerned have therefore supposedly been subject to the sort of management advocated by Mr Felmingham or Senator Abetz for many decades. Each area has experienced significant hazard-reduction burning, logging and regeneration burning. Yet they burnt fiercely and uncontrollably.
Mr Felmingham uses most of his column-inches to push the case for regeneration burning in logged oldgrowth forests. He says that such burns ‘remove much of the debris in a forest’. He fails to mention that most of that debris is there because the forest was logged! His argument therefore reduces to ‘we must log therefore we must burn’.
He says ‘some suggest that regeneration burns should cease forthwith because these have health effects and ultimately harm our tourist industry in the two weeks in March-April when our skies are affected’. This claim is both disingenuous and inaccurate.
First of all, the regeneration-burning season often extends not for two weeks, but for two months — well in into May.
Second, people are concerned about the sheer number of regeneration burns. Hundreds of these burns occur every autumn. Their proliferation points to an unsustainable rate of logging and burning in our native forests.
Thirdly, the regeneration burn is just one phase of the unacceptable treatment inflicted on our oldgrowth forests by Forestry Tasmania — from destructive logging through to their replacement by an even-aged crop of trees. The burn is part of a regime that permanently reduces biodiversity.
Fourthly, there is indeed a serious risk of regeneration burns escaping when Forestry Tasmania accumulates a backlog of such burns. We may well be approaching such a situation now. Last April and May were very wet. Many burns of clearfelled forest were put off. We could therefore be about to cop a double dose of such burns this autumn. With double the risk of escapes.
Fifthly, decades of such regeneration burning at Wielangta and the north-east did not prevent the devastating fires experienced in December.
Sixthly, many oldgrowth forests — particularly those with a well-developed rainforest understorey — contain their own natural fire retardants because they retain so much moisture. Logging opens them to the drying effects of wind and sun and creates vast amounts of dry tinder and kindling.
No, Mr Felmingham, the issue is not whether to burn. The issues are:
• How did December’s fires start and what actions will be taken to make the culprits accountable?
• To what extent has global warming contributed to the severity of recent fires?
• In what types of vegetation is hazard-reduction burning necessary and at what frequencies?
Geoff Law: The Wilderness Society
