Media release – Tourism Industry Council Tasmania, 12 April 2023
New Approach Needed to Forest Burns
Tasmania’s peak tourism industry organisation says a new approach is needed for forest management burns across the state during busy visitor periods.
CEO, Luke Martin, said Sustainable Timbers Tasmania needed to contemporise its regeneration burns schedule during busy visitor periods and in areas close to popular visitor nodes.
“The tourism industry respects the professionalism of our forest managers and the science behind regeneration burns.
‘Yet, every autumn, like clockwork, we hear the same frustrations from our tourism operators in the upper Derwent Valley and see the same comments from our interstate and overseas visitors frankly aghast about the scale of the smoke.
“It’s just embarrassing and not what we’re about as a destination in 2023.”
Mr Martin said STT needs to do more to minimise its burning schedule and be accountable for the impact of these burns.
“For years as a tourism industry we’ve sought to work with STT around minimising the impact of these burns on the visitor experience and the local community, and the need to manage the interests of all industries in these areas.
“As a starting point, they should draw a line with no burns over the busy long weekends and the Easter school holiday break when visitor activity is most concentrated in the region.
“This will at least give our tourism operators and their guests certainty that the visitor experience will not be compromised during the busiest times of the season. It’s a reasonable outcome that respects the interests of all stakeholders.”
Mr Martin said the growth in tourism in some of the former timber communities like Maydena and Derby, was one of the state’s great modern economic success stories, but with it comes challenges.
“The two industries can co-exist with give and take on both sides, but we need to find a way to resolve these long standing challenges that gives certainty to all businesses operating in these communities.”
Media release – The Wilderness Society Tasmania, 13 April 2023
Logging plays no part in Tasmania’s tourism future and that’s a step closer, thanks to TICT’s leadership
The Wilderness Society Tasmania welcomes the first-ever instance (that we are aware of) of the Tourism Industry Council publicly condemning the negative impacts of unnecessary logging fires on tourists and tourism operators.
“We welcome this leadership by the Tourism Industry Council (TICT) in condemning the recent widespread and unnecessary toxic smoke choking the state’s public airspace from unnecessary logging fires that impacted tourists and tourism operators,” said forest campaigner, Alice Hardinge.
“We agree with the TICT that a new approach is needed but addressing logging fires is just the start. We also agree that the future of transition towns like Maydena and Derby is tourism not logging and that these communities need to be supported instead of being abandoned, while their local forests are logged against their wishes.
“The problem is bigger than just logging fires. A more sustainable tourism industry cannot continue to support the logging industry that destroys the beauty of forest landscapes that local tourism operators depend upon. Logged and charred forests aren’t a tourist drawcard. Forests are more valuable as public assets for tourism than logging for a loss.
“The TICT continuing to support logging also undermines the tourism industry’s net-zero aspirations. And the line that tourism can coexist with logging is unrealistic: the logging industry’s forest destruction destroys beautiful forests that tourists appreciate, and that the tourism industry depends on.
“A more sustainable tourism industry in Tasmania could complement the transition to a more sustainable plantation-based forestry industry that no longer logs its forests – like New Zealand decided in 2002 and Victoria and Western Australia are heading towards too.
“Lutruwita / Tasmania moving on from forest destruction could also set up a lower-risk tourism industry alongside a more sustainable plantation-based forestry industry. This could open a new vista of forest tourism opportunities throughout the currently government-owned forests, like new Aboriginal-owned, run and land-returned tourism opportunities and giant tree tourism possibilities, among others. We encourage the TICT to continue to take steps in this direction,” said Ms Hardinge.
