‘Back the chainsaws’: Albo slammed amid calls to end decades-long ‘damaging’ forest logging

Pressure is mounting on Labor to intervene and end a ‘damaging’ act putting the country’s native forests in danger.

The decades-long fight to end native forest logging across Australia has come to a head as campaigners call on Anthony Albanese to intervene and end the “damaging”, costly action for good.

Demonstrators have gathered over the past two weeks across Australia, from Melbourne and Sydney to logging-affected towns like Ulladulla, as part of a co-ordinated protest action targeting Labor MPs.

Led by the Tasmania-based Bob Brown Foundation, the campaign aimed to pressure on Labor to end native forest logging countrywide.

During the ALP National Conference in Brisbane last week, founder Bob Brown issued an ultimatum to the Prime Minister.

Mr Brown, a former Greens leader, said if Mr Albanese kept felling forests, then voters would “clear-fall him”.

Demonstrators rallied on Victorian parliament steps in Melbourne to call for an end to native forest logging nationwide. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Josie Hayden

The rally formed part of a weeks-long campaign by the Bob Brown Foundation. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Josie Hayden

“Polls show voters of all parties favour ending logging,” Mr Brown said.

“With Labor, eight out of 10 Labor voters want it to end.

“But, Albo is with the small minority who back the chainsaws.

“Along with climate inaction, more coal mines and gas fracking, the tragedy of killing forests and wildlife will tell on Labor.”

The weeks-long campaign comes after decades of activism by environmentalists across the country to end native forest longing, including recent high-profile action on the NSW Central Coast and in Victoria.

The campaign targeted Labor MPs, with protests also held outside local offices. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Josie Hayden

Protesters called out the damaging environmental impact of native forest logging. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Josie Hayden

State-run agencies currently manage state forests across the country under longstanding Regional Forest Agreements (RFAs), struck between the federal government and the states in 2002.

Under the agreements, states are given an exemption from Commonwealth environment law to undertake logging operations in public forests, which proponents say provides jobs and crucial timber supply.

But environmental advocates claim native forest logging is not financially viable and is destroying important ecosystems, such as crucial habitat for endangered koalas on the NSW Central Coast.

South Brooman resident Bob Chapman surveys an area of logged forest in the Brooman State Forest. Picture: Nathan Schmidt

In May, the Victorian government announced it will end all native forest logging in the state some six years earlier than planned following severe bushfires and legal campaigns.

The move resulted in renewed pressure on the new NSW Labor government to also end logging in the state following extensive grassroots campaigns, including on the NSW south coast.

Following the Black Summer bushfires, south coast resident Takesa Frank launched a state government petition to end native forest logging which garnered more than 20,000 signatures.

Debris left behind after a logging operation in Shallow Crossing State Forest. Picture: Nathan Schmidt

Ms Frank, from Shallow Crossing near Ulladulla, said the Forestry Corporation of NSW (FCNSW) had resumed logging operations in forests near her lifelong home only months after the deadly firestorms.

“After the bushfires, we should have been recovering as a community,” Ms Frank said.

“Instead, we had to go into defence-protection mode because FCNSW … started logging in forests we fought hard to protect.”

The 20-year-old is one of many residents in the region involved in local grassroots environmentalist agencies, such as the South Brooman State Forest Conversation Group and Friends of the Forest.

The groups, many of which sprung up after the 2019-20 bushfires, have been involved not only in pushing to end native forest logging, but helping document alleged breaches by FCNSW of forestry rules.

Logging equipment in Shallow Crossing State Forest. Picture: Nathan Schmidt

FCNSW was fined $230,000 last year after the Environmental Protection Agency found it had allegedly carrying out illegal forestry activity at Dampier State Forest near Bodalla, potentially threatening at-risk bat species there.

At the time, a FCNSW spokesperson said the Forestry Corporation regretted that it made an error during operations, and removed trees from an area that should have been protected around a disused mine shaft.

NSW Nature Conservation Council CEO Jacqui Mumford described FCNSW as a “rogue” agency under the previous Liberal government.

Brooman State Forest Conversation Group is one of a number of grassroots movements that sprung up after the Black Summer bushfires. Picture: Nathan Schmidt

The group have campaigned to stop local logging, including at Shallow Crossing. Picture: Nathan Schmidt

She said changes to logging rules would put them on a “path to sustainable operations”.

“Public native forests create an economic gain from being protected, by generating carbon credits, tourism and recreation,” Ms Mumford said.

“Over 90 per cent of native forest that is logged in NSW is pulped and sent overseas to be used in woodchips and cardboard.”

Ms Mumford believed NSW was now “laggard” in the native forest logging space amid inaction by NSW Labor.

NSW Nature Conservation Council CEO Jacqui Mumford. Picture: Supplied

Western Australia, alongside Victoria, is poised to halt the practise, while Queensland will stop it south of Noosa.

“The NSW government has been covering the losses of the native forest logging industry for nearly a decade,” she said.

“It is not a profitable industry; in the past two years alone, $29 million of taxpayer money was spent subsidising native forest logging.

“Ending native forest logging and focusing on the profitable plantation sector would save taxpayers and our precious forests.”

For its part, the NSW government's audit office found FCNSW did not consistently monitor compliance of its contractors or assess risks.

An FCNSW spokesperson said in response committed to “making continued improvements to our operations where necessary”.

“Our staff care passionately about the forests they work in and, over the last three years, we have significantly increased our efforts around compliance,” the spokesperson said.

“This has included investment in technology solutions, putting more staff on the ground and a regular program of internal audits to supplement the external audits undertaken by our third party certifier and the EPA.”