The shame

Peter Adams
I think what really must irritate people like Dave is that I am an “insider” in the forestry industry and that I haven’t toed the FT line in order to maintain access to wood to do my sculpture and furniture. How selfish of me. But I’m sorry Dave, I’m just calling a spade a spade. Forestry Tasmania has through incompetence, collusion with Gunns and just plain stupidity, fucked up our forests to such an extent that in the near future there will be no speciality timbers—of any sufficient quantity—to maintain a uniquely vibrant furniture and boat building industry. If our forests had been managed by skilled foresters instead of duplicitous, pigheaded corporate hacks that can’t even turn a $1 profit with a billion dollar asset without huge subsidies, than I would have no need to complain or spend my morning writing to TT instead of enjoying the outdoors here at gorgeous Roaring Beach carving on a 6 meter log.

Dave, I’ve been involved in the carpentry trade (even as a union rep) and the furniture trade for 40 years. With a first degree from Harvard, I have the intelligence to have read all the reports and studies on the ecology of forests and their proper management. Simply put, Forestry Tasmania has been led by charismatic, business managers, not wise foresters and people who truly understand the value of what it is they have been charged with to look after. This truly is a shame. What we have as a government and FT business plan is to turn Tasmania into a pulp wood, wood chip state. Not good enough. Not good enough for the hard working, long suffering loggers and contractors of Maydena and elsewhere. And, not good enough for the tourism and other industries that would benefit from an intelligent management of our beautiful forests. Read more, comment here