Showing posts with label forests war. Show all posts
Showing posts with label forests war. Show all posts

Wednesday 13 January 2021

The Berejiklian Government appears willing to stand by and watch wild koalas rapidly go extinct in New South Wales within the next 30 years


Under cover of the public heath emergency created by the global COVID-19 pandemic, the Berejiklian Government is still not genuinely moving to save koala populations in New South Wales from extinction.


The Liberal Party leadership is still paralysed by the blackmail threats of National Party leader and MLA for Monaro John Barilaro - and so Liberal MLA for Hornsby Matt Kean in his conflicted role of Minister for Energy and Environment is doing little except mouthing soothing platitudes and making empty promises.


Because logging remaining native forests on Crown and private land - for woodchip, logs, sawn & dressed timber and biomass for power station/s - is what Liberal and Nationals shadowy political donors, greedy logging companies and developers hungry for cheap land are insisting needs to happen.


People in the Northern Rivers region are noticing.




The Sydney Morning Herald, 12 January 2021: 


Koala advocates say the NSW government is not doing enough to save the animal from extinction after it backed without qualification a quarter of the recommendations of an upper house inquiry into the marsupial's populations and habitat. 


In its formal response into the koala inquiry, the government supported 11 of the 42 recommendations, while offering "support in principle" to 17 others. 


It "noted" the remaining 14. Among the recommendations supported was the suggestion the government rule out opening old-growth forests within the state reserve for logging, and that it create Georges River National Park to secure habitat on Sydney's southern fringe. 


However, it only "noted" the call to investigate setting up a Great Koala National Park in northern NSW. 


“Recommendations such as the government urgently investigates the ‘utilisation of core koala habitat on private land and in state forests to replenish koala habitat lost in the bushfires’ appear to be rejected out of hand," Cate Faehrmann, the Greens MP and chair of the upper house committee, said. 


“Many of the key recommendations, the vast majority of which were supported by all committee members because they are what needs to be done to save koalas from extinction, seem to have been rejected outright." 


The inquiry's report, released last June, found koalas were on track for extinction in the wild in NSW before 2050 with habitat loss the main driver of their demise. Environment Minister Matt Kean said in the following month that he would set a goal to double the numbers of the animals - believed to be as few as 15,000 to 20,000 - by 2050.....


Tuesday 1 December 2020

Calls to halt new logging in bushfire impacted areas in New South Wales are not going away

 

Matters are not going exactly to plan for NSW Deputy-Premier, Minister for Regional New South Wales and Nationals MP for Monaro, John 'Barracuda' Barilaro.


With only another four weeks to the end of 2020 his timetable for legislative and regulatory changes, allowing farmers and developers to commence virtually unregulated clearing of native trees and vegetation before state parliament and local government return from the two-month holiday break, is now seriously behind schedule.


Neither mainstream nor social media has let go of the idea that it is environmentally destructive to be logging already bushfire-impacted forests and clearing what remains of koala food and shelter trees in the face of a looming extinction crisis and increasing climate change.


And when it comes to the Premier, despite his best efforts Barilaro hasn't managed to weaken her enough to cause a parliamentary leadership challenge in the NSW Liberal Party.


He is not yet the kingmaker he so obviously wants to be, even though he is casting less than subtle hints across the paths of journalists that Gladys Berejiklian is off her game, tired, making mistakes and that "A break would do her good" .


These are two examples of regional and national media articles published last Friday.....


Echo NetDaily, 27 November 2020:


More than 60 per cent of North Coast forests and 80 per cent of South Coast forests were burnt in the 2019–20 black summer fires. Since that point issues around the management and logging of these and other forests have been highlighted and ‘the Guardian has revealed that the Natural Resources Commission (NRC) will likely be engaged to conduct a review to “consider the standards that should be in place for forestry operations after bushfires.”,’ said Independent NSW MLC Justin Field.


Mr Field has called on the NSW government to give an undertaking to NSW coastal communities that new approvals for logging in the state’s badly burnt public state forests will not be approved until a review by the state’s Independent NRC is completed.


It’s one year to the week since the devastating Currowan fire took hold on the South Coast. The community always understood business as usual wasn’t possible after the fires but the politics has been slow to move and a lot of damage has been done,’ said Mr Field.


This review is a political fix to try to find a circuit breaker in what has been an escalating public conflict between John Barilaro’s department and the NSW EPA. The NRC are effectively being asked to be the arbiter in this disagreement.


Logging breaches


In part this review is in response to numerous EPA stop-work orders and investigations into breaches by Forestry Corporation under the burnt forest logging rules.


I am seeking an undertaking from the Government that new approvals for logging in bushfire affected forests will not be granted until we’ve seen the outcome of the review,’ Mr Field said.


The review comes after a public dispute between Deputy Premier John Barilaro’s Department of Regional NSW and the NSW Environment Protection Authority over the ‘site specific operating conditions’ the EPA had put in place to minimise environmental damage of burnt forest logging,’ says Mr Field.


The dispute had led to the EPA warning Forestry Corporation that plans to move back to logging under pre-fire conditions would likely breach the NSW Forestry Act which requires ecologically sustainable forest management practices. ‘


Local Greens Member for Ballina Tamara Smith told Echonetdaily that, ‘The Greens oppose logging in native forests on a good day, let alone after catastrophic bushfires and the subsequent destruction of wildlife and biodiversity on an unprecedented scale in NSW last summer.


I and thousands of environmentalists begged the government to send in ecologists after the fires last summer not loggers, but they did any way.


The idea that with 1.7 degrees of global warming already locked in that logging of native forests is even on the table is the kind of environmental vandalism that future generations will study as pivotal to sealing a fate of extinction for koalas and platypus and countless other species,’ said Ms Smith…...


The Guardian, 27 November 2020: 


NSW’s EPA has issued stop-work orders to the state-owned Forestry Corporation for breaches 
of its licence in bushfire-hit forests on the north and south coasts. 
Photograph: Lisa Maree Williams/Getty Images








The New South Wales government is planning a review of forestry operations in bushfire-hit coastal regions as tensions mount between the environment regulator and Forestry Corporation. 


The review, which is still to be formally commissioned, will probably be carried out by the state’s Natural Resources Commission (NRC), government sources have told Guardian Australia. 


The state’s Environment Protection Authority (EPA) has issued the state-owned Forestry Corporation with a series of stop-work orders this year for breaches of its licence in bushfire-hit forests on the south and north coasts. 


Last month, the EPA started five prosecutions against Forestry Corporation in the land and environment court for alleged breaches of its licence in a forest near Coffs Harbour. 


Because of the destruction caused by the bushfires, the EPA had set stricter standards for logging operations covered by the coastal integrated forestry operations approval (IFOA). 


The EPA’s application of the post-bushfire rules has frustrated the industry and the Department of Regional NSW wrote to the agency in September to say forestry believed environmental protections set out in its approval remained adequate after the fires. 


But MPs and residents of coastal NSW have been dismayed at the logging of fire-affected habitat given the scale of disaster and its effect on threatened plants and animals, including koalas. 


The planned review will consider the standards that should be in place for forestry operations after bushfires and try to chart a path back to the use of the coastal IFOA. 


The NRC provides independent advice to government and was the agency that delivered the report on the Barwon-Darling water-sharing plan, which found the riverine system was in crisis. 


The independent MP, Justin Field, who is based on the south coast, asked the forestry minister, John Barilaro, about the “now-public dispute” between the EPA and regional NSW and what the government was doing to ensure forestry operations were ecologically sustainable. 


Field told Guardian Australia the NRC “will effectively be the arbiter in the disagreement between Forestry Corporation and the EPA over what logging could sustainably happen in burnt forest”. 


“This is in response to numerous EPA stop-work orders and investigations into breaches under the burnt forest logging rules,” he said. 


“I welcome this review. The public has recommended that business as usual after the fires is not possible.” 


He said an independent assessment of the impact of logging on burnt forest and wood supply was appropriate. 


“I hope this leads to a conversation about a transition away from public native forestry to plantations and private land forestry.” A spokesman for Barilaro would not confirm a formal review......


Tuesday 17 November 2020

The NSW Native Vegetation Regulatory interactive map was last updated on the 1 November 2020 and shows land on which native vegetation regulations may be weakened or removed by the Berejiklian Government before 26 November 2020

 


This is the Native Vegetation Regulatory (NVR) Map which was last updated on the 1 November 2020.

This is an interactive map which community researchers can access at:
https://www.lmbc.nsw.gov.au/Maps/index.html?viewer=NVRMap.

The mapping covers:

Category 1 – exempt land – native vegetation clearing is allowed without approval from Local Land Services. Category 2 – regulated land – authorisation may be required from Local Land Services for native vegetation clearing. This may include clearing under the Land Management (Native Vegetation) Code 2018. Landholders also have a range of allowable clearing activities available to them for use without approval from Local Land Services. 

Category 2 – vulnerable regulated land is designated as steep or highly erodible lands, protected riparian land or special category land. Use of the Land Management (Native Vegetation) Code 2018 and allowable clearing activities are restricted in these areas. 

Category 2 – sensitive regulated land is designated as environmentally sensitive. Clearing under the Land Management (Native Vegetation) Code 2018 is not permitted in these areas, although there is a limited list of allowable clearing activities available. Excluded land is managed outside the land management framework. Other clearing controls may exist in these areas. 

Category 2 – vulnerable regulated land is displayed on the NVR map as Orange

While Category 2 – sensitive regulated land is displayed  as Pink

In some circumstances, Category 2 – sensitive regulated land and Category 2 – vulnerable regulated land exist on the same land. If these two categories overlap, they are displayed as Brown on the map.

Excluded land is displayed as Grey

Category 2 – vulnerable regulated land can include: 

steep and highly erodible land: land with a slope >18 degrees and/or where soil characteristics, slope and rainfall erosion present a high erosion risk 

protected riparian landland within 20 meters of the bed or bank of a named natural watercourse or waterbody. This land filters runoff into streams and provides habitat for many plant and animal species and, in many cases, are the only remaining natural corridors in the landscape. 

special category land: exists over some areas of NSW considered to be at particular environmental risk and includes land vulnerable to soil erosion, salinity, sedimentation and/or landslip. 

Environmentally sensitive land defined as 'special category land' could include the following: 
  • Aboriginal site protection 
  • coastal dune protection 
  • erosion hazards 
  • flora and fauna protection 
  • geological/geomorphological site protection 
  • habitat protection, 
  • scenic values 
  • mass movement areas, and 
  • saline areas. 

Category 2 sensitive regulated land includes a wide range of land including: 
  • Old growth forest 
  • Rainforest 
  • Critically endangered ecological communities 
  • Critically endangered plants 
  • Core koala habitat 
  • High conservation value grasslands or other groundcover 
  • Areas of outstanding biodiversity value 
  • Ramsar wetlands within the meaning of the federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 
  • Land described as Coastal Wetlands in the Coastal Zone referred to in the Coastal Management Act
  • Land described as Littoral Rainforest in the Coastal Zone referred to in the Coastal Management Act 
  • Land is subject to an approved conservation measure that was the basis for other land being biodiversity certified. 
As well as land that is under various official conservation agreements or set aside for other conservation, offset or remedial undertakings.

BACKGROUND