13/05/2005 - The Tasmanian
Labor and Federal Coalition Governments
today have announced a simplistic package
that fails to solve the most significant
issue affecting Tasmania’s natural environment
- says WWF-Australia.
This problem has a workable solution. Today
both Governments rejected the solution and
chose to keep clearing the land.
“Land clearing causes extinctions: Australia
must stop clearing its native vegetation,”
WWF-Australia CEO, Mr Greg Bourne said.
Today, 657 species of animals and plants
in Tasmania are threatened with extinction
in the wild. Unless Australia stops land
clearing, the number will increase dramatically.
Mr Bourne said: “This simplistic package
repeats the mistakes of the original Regional
Forest Agreement. It creates new reserves,
but undermines their benefits by explicitly
encouraging the clearing and converting
of yet more native forests for yet more
plantations.
“We have come nowhere since 1997. You could
be tempted to say this is Groundhog Day.”
WWF-Australia recognised the global significance
of the Tarkine rainforest and has successfully
pushed for its protection - and commend
the decision to protect it.
However, while the iconic old trees have
been saved, both Governments have taken
the symbolic easy option rather than confront
the real and complex environmental problem
facing Tasmania - the massive clearing of
Tasmania's native vegetation.
“It’s more than the forests,” Mr Bourne
said. “Most threatened species do not inhabit
old growth forests, tall wet eucalypt forests
or rainforests. They inhabit open woodlands,
streamside vegetation, dry forests, heathlands,
rocky and stony habitat, native grasslands,
coastal scrub, wetlands and semi-improved
grasslands - this is the very land that
will be cleared."
WWF-Australia’s Blueprint for the Forest
Industry and Vegetation Management in Tasmania
released in July 2004 provides a solution
to the key environmental problems facing
Tasmania while allowing for a vibrant forest
industry.
“The health of the economy is ultimately
dependent upon the health of the environment
- the simplistic forest package announced
today has failed to deliver long term solutions,”
Mr Bourne said.
