Last night nearly one hundred Tasmanians attended a University of Tasmania forum to find solutions to the conflicts over Tasmania’s forests and forest industries.
‘One of the things that got us interested in this, was the chance to get some different perspectives and ideas to how we might solve the conflict over forestry,’ said Dr Phill Pullinger.
‘This issue is much more complex than is often portrayed and Tasmanian’s views are a lot more diverse than those wedded to conflict would have us think. This was a good chance to explore this.’
Four speakers gave short presentations followed by a question and answer session. Speakers were Gerard Castles, a business consultant with knowledge in conflict resolution, Judith Ajani, a forest resources economist from Australian national University, Chris Harwood, a plantations researcher, from the Cooperative Research Centre for Forestry, and Peter Mcquillan, an ecologist from the University of Tasmania.
Ideas covered ranged from the need to shift the debate to a discussion on values rather than positions, the importance of people with ‘middle of the road’ views speaking out, through to options for using the timber from the burgeoning plantation estate to allow greater native forest protection, and using different approaches to native forest harvest such as single stem extraction and lower volume – high value native forest use.
Environment Tasmania Liaison Officer, Russell Warman said, ‘There were a lot of different visions and ideas put forward, but what stood out through all that, was a sense that Tasmanian’s really want to find new ways forward.’
The forum was organised by the School of Geography and Environmental Studies at the Tasmanian University and Environment Tasmania.
Dr. Phill Pullinger, Director, Environment Tasmania
