Economy
It is a bloody conspiracy. Private Carbon Reserves. Ikea Tasmania …
#5. ‘Why do you keep looking for the complicated conspiracy explanation when the simple one is so bloody obvious?’
The timber industry has a long history of misinformation, deceit, one-sided accounting, dependence on public funding and control of government.
They hate activists and have tried to nullify their effects by having special laws written at their behest containing clauses like Section 11.
Their lawyers have influenced the writing of the speciality laws like the PAL Act and they have been proved to be ‘critically non-compliant’ by the RPDC.
They have ‘acquired’ 300 000 hectares of plantations, most of which was once publicly owned forest. they were the beneficiary of a one-sided ladn swap where 97 000 hectares of forested land disappeared off the public registr and was never accounted for.
They make deals over private luncheons that affect the entire economy of the state and exclude the public from any enquiries.
They have the State Treasurer flying over to Europe to spruik the case for Gunns at public expense and they have treated many other government members to free trips to Europe and South America to ‘examine’ dissimilar pulp mills.
They conned the government into fast-tracking the mill approval after having lied about the reasons for this quick solution. They moverd the goal posts from a ‘world’s best practice’ to a chlorine bleach mill AFTER they received the approval they wanted.
They have at least eight, and possibly more dedicated groups such as FIAT, Stewards of the Forest, FSC, Mill Task Force, DAFF, etc to ‘examine’ and push the timber industry to both the people and the government, all paid for by us.
They have the full use of the police to act against protesters who object to seeing their native forests destroyed and they have actively used SLAPP litigation to sue any person who opposes their will.
They infiltrate any organisation that they see as a threat to their activities and pay huge amounts of money into political party funds to see that their cause is favoured and that forestry never becomes an election issue.
They are ‘self-regulating’ and victimise inspectors who highlight their breaches of the forestry code of practice. All complaints against forestry are handled internally and no action is EVER taken.
They spray toxic chemicals over huge areas of Tasmania and poison our drinking water catchments. They pay minimal rates and no land tax and their plantations are supported by tax-break Ponzi schemes.
They have mechanised harvesting of plantations to such an extent that the number of people employed by the industry has declined dramatically ever since the inception of the woodchipping busines.
They destroy all wildlife without conscience that threatens their plantations.
They get subsidies from the public purse that sees that the infrastructure they need is paid for by the taxpayer.
Their own lawyers advise the planning scheme operatives and several of the local councils to their own benefit.
There are ex-premiers on the boards of their largest company and they exert undue political influence by the old buddy system, even to the point where they attended parliament as advisers during the crucial pulp mill debate. They invented the MIS swindle and they are the masters of misinformation and impropaganda.
Now maybe you can see why we ‘keep looking for the complicated conspiracy explanation when the simple one is so bloody obvious.’ With a history like this, the most obvious answer is, it IS a bloody conspiracy!!
This comment appears on this article HERE. Comment HERE
And …
Here is a scheme where I consider there is a great deal of ‘Common Ground’.
A few years I bought sixty-six acres of land in an iconic area to prevent it from being logged. At the time I thought I would just keep it and preserve the area. In the past, the area was partially clearfelled and there is now natural regrowth over about one third, while the rest remains old growth with some very large trees amongst it.
If I were to declare this a Private Timber Reserve, (PTR) I would get substantial financial concessions from both a tax and rates point of view. However, there is an implication, if not an obligation, to harvest the timber at some later date. This I do not want to do. Now that Carbon Sequestration and Carbon Trading is a major issue, and it has recently been proved that Tasmania’s Old Growth trees store three times more carbon than was previously thought, I would like to be able to declare this a new category and preserve it as a ‘Private Carbon Reserve’, (PCR) with the same tax-breaks and trading facilities as a PTR or an MIS plantation.
There is a distinct advantage to this approach over the PTR and MIS system, in that this actually preserves the existing carbon held in the trees and uses the forest areas and regrowth as a carbon absorbing sink, whereas the MIS approach releases the carbon back into the atmosphere on a cyclic system every 13 years or so, and the plantation trees NEVER attain the size of the trees they replace. Also the 40% of carbon stored in the ground is also released by the sterilization burns that accompany clearfelling.
Here is an opportunity to start an actual Carbon Positive system that would benefit and ameliorate climate change, substantially reduce atmospheric pollution by absorption of CO2 and reduction of forestry burns, which contribute 30% of carbon emissions worldwide, and at the same time, preserve our native forest heritage, benefit our tourist industry, preserve our wildlife and ecosystems, and yet still be a tradable commodity, either privately or by the government in exchange for concessions to the grower. It would encourage both private investors and landowners, as well as the MIS companies to become conservationists rather than look for quick returns from the usual destructive woodchips approach, and carries with it a potentially higher return on their investment and without all the water and pesticide-related health problems we are currently encountering. (This alone is worth a fortune in unquantified benefits!)
The scheme is also highly eco-friendly and maintains biodiversity.
Timber would become a more valuable asset left standing than destroyed, in that it would attract an annual Carbon Trading fee. Harvesting and regrowing is an expensive process and the one-off returns that Forestry get on 95% of forests are as low as $13 a dry tonne for chips. Prices currently being mooted for carbon credits are between $20 and $30 per tonne of CO2. Here are some interesting figures. One tonne of Carbon generates 2.283 tonnes of CO2 when combined with oxygen. The reverse is also true. To produce one tonne of carbon stored in a tree, it absorbs 2.383 tonnes of carbon dioxide and releases 1.283 tonnes of oxygen back into the atmosphere.
Tasmanian trees are 3 times more carbon dense than originally thought and contain approximately 45% carbon by weight.
One hectare of forest yields about 120 tonnes of usable timber, but according to the NAFI submission to the Garnaut report, 50% of all the trees harvested is left on the forest floors as wastage, which is generally burnt afterwards. The ground itself contains another forty percent of carbon which is released after a high temperature burn. Altogether a forest sequesters approximately (240 x 45%) + (240 x 40%) = 204 tonnes of carbon per hectare. At a mere $20 per tonne trading price, this is equal to a minimum of $4080 per hectare per year as Carbon Credits. Why the hell are we cutting it down AND giving companies a tax break to do it? This far exceeds the value of native wood chips or plantation timber. What is required is an official accreditation system that quantifies the carbon stored in each type of forest and can designate the boundaries to a carbon coupe. In this way a positive carbon value can be arrived at for trading purposes, and if they control the records, this can then be monitored to prevent double sales and also to keep track by satellite images of any timber cutting. In this way, a future purchaser of Carbon Credits can know for sure that he is getting what he pays for and that he can genuinely offset them against his carbon emissions.
In the meantime, we need to see the first steps of this system implemented, which is to legally allow PCR’s to obtain the same rates and tax benefits as PTR’s in order for the timber to be saved. From every angle, this appears to be a win-win situation.
Barnaby Drake.
Posted by Gerry Mander on 15/01/10 at 06:44 AM
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Sweden has IKEA and are world famous for their timber products, yet they have nothing like the variety of fine woods we have here. This is real value-adding.
Why is it that Tasmania, with all its advantages is so impoverished when it comes to producing commercial scale products from its wonderful assets? Why are we still stuck in this woodchip mentality approach when we could be world leaders and with an industry that really benefits Tasmania rather than one momopolistic company?
As our agriculture collapses, our job opportunites only seem to revolve round more-of-the-same typical destruction of assets. We need some visionary thinking and enterprise. For far less than the subsidies we pay to MIS, Forestry and Gunns, we could have a wonderful, world-beating industry based here with thousand of REAL jobs created, as well as revaluing and preserving our assets.
Opportunity knocks, but is there anybody listening?
Posted by Gerry Mander on 15/01/10 at 07:08 AM