Justin Miller Pulp Mill Address to the People – 23/09/07
Other countries seek Tasmanian produce for two reasons, quality, and our image in that it comes from a clean and pristine environment. They don’t want our stuff because it’s cheaper, because it’s not. Our cost of production makes our produce dearer, so we can not compete in terms of price. On an international stage our only strengths to compete with, and which stands us apart from the rest, are quality and our clean green image. If we risk this, then in the long term we are risking thousands of jobs throughout Tasmania. It won’t just affect the Tamar valley. If any cases of contamination or pollution happen down the track, it will affect our image as a state. Tassie is seen as a very small place and people won’t differentiate between areas close to the pulp mill and others which are not. Just recently a friend of my father’s called in to work to say “hello”. He is a cattle salesman for “Killa faddy”. When asked how things were going up there? He replied, “a bit slow. There just aren’t the cattle about at the moment.” His reason being was that cattle pasture was being turned into plantations.
MY name is Justin Miller. I am 32 and have lived in Hillwood in the Tamar Valley all my life where I have helped run our family business Miller’s Orchards, which was established by my grandfather back in the 1930s.
We employ around 20 full time workers and up to 60 at the height of the season.
Our enterprise consists mainly of apples but also of cherries which Tasmania has an increasing demand. A large portion of our produce is destined for the export market. Last year we sent apples to Taiwan and cherries to numerous countries including France, Italy and Holland.
During the fight against the pulp mill we have heard so much talk about the importance of our image abroad. It is however so very true.
Other countries seek Tasmanian produce for two reasons, quality, and our image in that it comes from a clean and pristine environment. They don’t want our stuff because it’s cheaper, because it’s not. Our cost of production makes our produce dearer, so we can not compete in terms of price. On an international stage our only strengths to compete with, and which stands us apart from the rest, are quality and our clean green image. If we risk this, then in the long term we are risking thousands of jobs throughout Tasmania.
It won’t just affect the Tamar valley. If any cases of contamination or pollution happen down the track, it will affect our image as a state. Tassie is seen as a very small place and people won’t differentiate between areas close to the pulp mill and others which are not.
Just recently a friend of my father’s called in to work to say “hello”. He is a cattle salesman for “Killa faddy”. When asked how things were going up there? He replied, “a bit slow. There just aren’t the cattle about at the moment.” His reason being was that cattle pasture was being turned into plantations.
The Longford meat company employs around 600 people and they rely on a certain volume of beef to continually keep them employed. So if the total volume of cattle was to drop 25%, which given the amount of plantations being put in is probably a modest amount, then that would mean 150 to 200 meat workers would be out of work and that’s just in one company alone. That’s just one area the proposed pulp mill is already affecting.
So with things like this and together with the possibility of our image being tarnished, the pulp mill’s initial major positive, which was jobs, is being outweighed already.
Of course we need to create jobs for our people and the economy, but there are so many other ways in which we can do so.
Tas Alkaloids is a company I am using as an example. They use poppies grown on our farms here in Tassie and make morphine destined for the European market. That company employs around 220 people at their plant.
TPI enterprise just recently became the third business in the poppy game to open up. So between TPI enterprise, Tas Alkaloids and GlaxoSmithKline, they employ around 500 people, and that’s without including the farmers which grow the poppies for them. Then in turn farmers need fertilizers and machinery and so on, so that has a flow on effect as well.
This is the sort of industry we need here in Tasmania. It employs people in a wide range of jobs, is environmentally sound and we don’t need to spend millions of dollars of taxpayers’ money on propaganda to sell it to the Tasmanian people.
In fact if they spent a portion of the same money on research into alternative markets for Tasmania produce overseas, imagine how many jobs they might create broadening and growing the horticultural sector.
Remember there is always a market for quality and Tasmanians are continually finding niche markets for themselves overseas, in aquaculture as well, but it takes time and money to travel and to do research.
It just doesn’t seem fair that they should spend so much of our money on one private company, on one project that the people of Tasmania clearly do not support anyway.
It doesn’t mean everyone has to be a farmer because farmers need electricians, mechanics, nurses and bank managers as well. It just means that when you have a strength you should build around it, not put it at a risk.
And then there’s tourism as well. The year before last Tasmania was voted the second most beautiful Island in the world. If we can hang on to our pristine image Tassie has a great future for years to come as the rest of the world falls further behind.
The bottom line is, we don’t know and they don’t know what the effects of the industry will be until it’s up and running and by then it will be too late to go back! A pulp mill that big in a place this small and beautiful, simply isn’t worth the risk.
Regards,
Justin Miller
Hillwood 7252.
