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Timber workers have been working in and careering for the forests of the Florentine Valley since the 1940’s it holds a strong heritage of timber getting and providing family incomes.

For nearly 60 years the Florentine and Styx Valley’s provided the major supply of wood to the Boyer news print mill for the production of news print for our nation’s news papers.

“Modern forest management involves planning long term harvesting cycles and insuring that special values in the forest are maintained.” Mr Richard Shoobridge Vice President Derwent Valley branch of Timber Communities Australia said today.

Tasmania is leading the World in conservation management with almost half our native forest in reserve, this is almost 5 times the standard set by the WWF to protect biological diversity and other high conservation forest values.

“Tasmania has also 1.9 million ha of high quality wilderness in World Heritage Areas, National Parks and conservation areas, the approved selective harvest and regeneration of the planned 50 ha coupe in the Upper Florentine will have no impact on our important wilderness values.”

“The approved harvesting will maintain employment for timber families and provide high quality timber to our furniture makers and for our first class sawmill industry.”

“The approved harvesting is being restricted to only the 10% of the Upper Florentine Valley that has been identified as available for long rotation selective harvesting.”

“Often overlooked is the fact that the balance between conservation and production has been achieved via the Tasmanian Regional Forest Agreement and Tasmanian Community Forest Agreement.”

“This balance means 80% of our old growth forest is reserved and all our forest both inside and outside reserves are managed for tourism, for carbon storage and for conservation values.”

After all the World Heritage Mission that inspected these forests last year found:

The area managed under the TWWHA management plan provides a good representation of well-managed tall Eucalyptus forest and there is similar forest outside the property which is also well-managed, but for both conservation and development objectives. The threats to these forests from production forestry activities are well managed and there no need for the boundary of the property to be changed to deal with such threats.

“This finding of sustainable management vindicates timber communities and we now call on these anti forestry activists to respect the work that has gone into achieving this world recognized balance.” Mr. Shoobridge concluded.

ENDS

For more information contact:

Richard Shoobridge TEL: 0409 992 687
Barry Chipman TEL: 0417 013 336