Forestry Tasmania signed wood supply agreements for unspecified volumes of peeler billets to Ta Ann Tasmania dated 16 January 2006. The contracts are available on the Forestry Tasmania website. In 2010 these contracts which were legally valid to 2022 were extended out by a further 5 years. The reason for this extension remains unclear, however, the overarching Tasmanian Regional Forestry Agreement (1997) expires in November 2017.
David Bartlett, then Premier of Tasmania wrote a letter dated 8 October 2010 to FIAT CEO Terry Edwards regarding renewal of wood supply contracts by Forestry Tasmania.
The Premier wrote: ‘I have sought advice from my colleague, Resources Minister Bryan Green, regarding your [Terry Edwards] request for Forestry Tasmania to begin negotiations with existing customers to extend their contracts through to 2027. The minister has advised me that there would be sufficient resources to satisfy all existing high-quality sawlog volumes through to the same date. I am pleased to confirm that FT has indicated a willingness to commence those negotiations and has provided the assurance concerning long-term supply in written advice to the minister.’
On 8 October 2010, FIAT released this statement that they agreed to be a signatory of the Statement of Forest Principles Agreement:
“These have been extremely difficult discussions for the industry as they go to the very heart of the industry’s resource supply and security and we have been concerned that there was insufficient protection of contractual and statutory obligations. We have received an assurance from the Premier [David Bartlett] in response to an approach from FIAT that contracts and statutory obligations will be protected and the agreement would have to be read in that way” Mr Edwards said.
http://www.fiatas.com.au/index.php?id=399&searched=2010+media+releases&advsearch=oneword&highlight=ajaxSearch_highlight+ajaxSearch_highlight1+ajaxSearch_highlight2+ajaxSearch_highlight3
On 19 October 2021, FIAT was confident that existing wood supply contracts would be ‘honoured and extended’:
The guarantee provided by the Premier [David Bartlett] and Forestry Tasmania that wood supply contracts must be honoured and extended has provided the industry with the certainty it requires to progress to the stage of detailed consideration of options for the future.
http://www.fiatas.com.au/index.php?id=400&searched=2010+media+releases&advsearch=oneword&highlight=ajaxSearch_highlight+ajaxSearch_highlight1+ajaxSearch_highlight2+ajaxSearch_highlight3
Mr Edwards believed the Premier’s letter gave ‘an absolute assurance by the Premier that wood supply agreements to existing companies would be extended to 2027.’ [Hansard 10 November 2010 House of Assembly]
On 10 November 2010 Kim Booth [Greens MP] asked David Bartlett to explain ‘in simple English’ the content of the letter Terry Edwards received on guaranteed wood supply.
Mr Booth: ‘Premier, will you again rule out allowing Forestry Tasmania to enter into any further contracts that would pre-empt any negotiated agreements until the [roundtable] talks are concluded and will you now also ensure that no-one within your Government or Forestry Tasmania is allowed to continue to destabilise the talks?’
Bartlett did not answer Mr Booth’s question.
Nick McKim [Greens MP] was asked a similar question about Premier Bartlett’s letter date 8 October 2010 to Terry Edwards.
Mr McKim replied: ‘Clearly there is no commitment in that letter to extend wood supply contracts to 2027.’
The Liberal Opposition asked whether the Statement of Forest Principles [signed on 14 October] and the Premier’s letter dated 8 October allowed new wood supply contracts, or the current contracts to be extended once they expired.
Bryan Green did not answer that question either.
Mark Shelton [Liberal MP] brought to the House of Assembly a motion relating to an amendment to the RFA that expired in 2017. The existing RFA guaranteed certain resource security to that date. His motion included a paragraph: Calls on the State Government to immediately commence negotiations with the Federal Government to provide a 20-year evergreen Regional Forest Agreement from 2017 and to provide for rolling renewals of the RFA after each five-yearly review and calls on the Government to guarantee the extension of wood supply agreements for native forest logging until 2027.
Shelton referred to Premier Bartlett’s letter where the industry signed up to an agreement believing that they would have their forest agreements or contracts for wood supply extended to 2027 through a negotiated process.
The Greens MPs took the view that the extension of wood supply contracts ‘pre-empted the Regional Forestry Agreement which expires in 2017’
Resources Minister Bryan Green accepted that ‘the RFA exists until 2017… I am telling you the RFA exists as legal until 2017.’
Mr Green went on: ‘Why does this magical date 2027 exist?… I can tell you why it exists. Ta Ann has contracts until then. So in the discussions [in the roundtable talks] between the ENGOs and the industry – the ENGOs recognise that there is a contractual arrangement in place with respect to those materials.’
Mr Green then continued: ‘…you [Mark Shelton, Liberal] come in here and run an argument about certainty, about a volume that you do not have any idea about, you do not know what the outcome of the [roundtable] negotiations is, so you are just effectively saying that we sign off on an agreement to give a [wood supply] guarantee until 2027. You do not know whether 150 000 cubic metres is going to be the volume going forward. You do not know what the negotiated outcome is.’
‘…Forestry Tasmania has assured me that there is enough wood outside of the reserve system that has been proposed by the ENGOs to enable us to honour our wood supply contracts through to 2027. That is exactly what Forestry Tasmania has said to me, that there is enough wood outside the high-value-conservation areas as proposed by the ENGOs to sustain the forest industry through to that point [2027].’
[Reference: Hansard House of Assembly,10 November 2010]
POST SCRIPT: The current annual wood supply awarded to Ta Ann out to 2027 is 265,000 cubic metres of peeler billets – 150,000 cubic metres for the Southwood facility and 115,000 cubic metres for the Smithton facility. The specification for peeler billets has been removed from the publicly available wood supply contract between FT and Ta Ann.
In July 2011 Bill Kelty’s process led to an Intergovernmental Agreement document that stated: Wood supply for the remaining industry will be guaranteed at a volume of 265,000 cubic metres of peeler billets per year.
• To: The Rainforest Alliance
Anita Neville
Dear Anita
Please find our representation on Gunns’ certification proposal for FSC Forest Management Certification through the Rainforest Alliance in PDF format.
I trust the RA finds our views useful and pertinent.
Sincerely,
Andrew Ricketts
Convenor
The Environment Association (TEA) Inc.
PO Box 261
Deloraine 7304
• Download:
TEA_to_Rainforest_Alliance_on_Gunns_FM_TT_17-8-2012.pdf
