The Australian media has been in a frenzy over a proposed pulp mill for the Tamar Valley in Tasmania. Most recent objections have included the idea that the mill should be located away from wineries. Yesterday, Barry Chipman from the NGO Timber Communities Australia had the following response:
Following claims that the proposed Bell Bay pulp mill could impact upon the Tamar Valley’s valued wineries Timber Communities Australia conducted its own research looking at the economic make up of other major wine producing regions.
“That research commenced at what TCA saw as the top of the tree in wine producing regions; being the Bordeaux region in South West France, The region is promoted as the Fine Wine Capital of the World and our findings where quite amazing in light of what’s being claimed here.” Barry Chipman Tasmanian State Manager Timber Communities Australia said today
The Bordeaux region produces 800 million litres of the highest quality wine annually, the region also attracts 3 million tourists annually.
Along side of this world leading fine wine and tourist industry is a very devise cultivated forest industry producing, Kraft pulp (Smurfit Kappa Cellulose de Pin pulp mill) glazed Kraft paper, Liner Kraft paper, Fluff pulp, and the full range of sawn timber products. (Including many wine crates) This wood products industry generates 2.5 billon EUR annually.
The Bordeaux region is also internationally recognised as a major scientific and technical centre for wood, product research including a major focus upon pulp and paper in particular ECF technology, the centre employs 200 researchers.
Then over in the neighbouring North East is another major fine wine and tourist region of Probence, and within the region surrounded by fine wine vineyards, is the Tarscon-sur-Rhone ECF pulp mill. (This is the same technology as the proposed Bell Bay pulp mill.)
Upon learning how, French wine producers and wood and paper products producers appear to prosper in harmony with each other it is hoped that this can also translate to Tamar Valley.
Perhaps those that seem to have doubts about this could just as a starter follow TCA’s lead and “Goggle” Bordeaux then follow up with ECF pulp mills Bordeaux France
Tasmania should not be left behind by the French we to can be a world leader in demonstrating harmony between all industries. Mr Chipman concluded
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
I’ve been to that pulp mill. It stinks out the local area and it’s attracted some criticism re: local health effects. But then much of France is an industrial conveyor belt. They could learn a thing or 2 from Aussies but they have less space, more regional activism and in europe various industries and residential areas are much more likely to overlap. That has it’s pros and cons. If you want to start arguing for that case (multiple use zoning) in Aust then you need to go the whole way, don’t just draw a convenient boundary.
France a world leader in demonstrating industrial harmony? AHAHAHAHA AHAHA AHAHA HAAHAHAH HAH AH HAH AHAHAHAHA HA
Double standards are central to the green movement’s modus operandi. The international forest stewardship council had no trouble whatsoever in recognising and certifying the sustainable management of European “native forests”. But they allowed the Australian greens to completely subordinate their core forest management principles to the political objectives of Ubermeister Brown so they could refuse certification to Australian public and private native forests that have been managed under long term harvest cycles for more than a century.
This double standard with the pulp mill is nothing new. It might be worth googling up what sort of industries also coexist with the Californian wine industry, the German wine industry and all their associated tourism infrastructure.
These $hitbags will say anything to get their way.
pinxi
Why be so negative? I have just done a bit of internet surfing about what makes Bordeaux tick, and it sure does present a pretty solid case for demonstrating harmony between all industries.
Being recognised as the wine capital of the world along with having 4.4 million acres of forest plantations and a tourist industry that is massive to say the least, then there are their aerospace industries. I would say this demonstrates a very diverse economy, just the goal we are hoping for here in Tas.
Once-swampland (the drainage started long ago), is now all montonous ha upon ha of montonous pine plantations. Industrial harmony indeed, native habitat has gone to buggery.
How quick people here, for sake of convenience, forgot that europe is the despised epicentre for pinkos! Particularly the frogs with their flirtation with socialism, their state engineered industry and their recent track record of inwards-looking anti-competitive regulation. (Sideline: There’s no shortage of industrial action or willingness to riot in France).
In wanting to isolate & transplant a model of European industry you form narrow conclusions about waht makes it tick and on something as complex as (alleged) “industrial harmony” by ignoring all the contributory historical & sociopolitical factors. eg There’s no wilderness there to protect, to object about.
So how would you achieve a model of shared-zoning and industrial harmony today in democratic state like Tassie? By developing a range and scale of industries, that given current circumstances, is acceptable to the majority (eg locally sensitive). That’s a great goal to have, but you should already know from past experience that it won’t work if it’s actually just an expansionist logging agenda.
Glad to see you fellows finally doing some homework on the greater environment even if it’s only via the internet. Perhaps we can look forward to a “bright” green flag flying TCA in future.
Now let’s get down to some practice in this pulpy woody choppy biz. We need more on why Gunns got only an ECF instead of the latest TCF Kraft project and why I can’t see precautionary solutions in the design like near total recycling of effluents.
Things like sludge and black liquor storage, settling and recovery tanks, purification ponds capable of holding a significant or major plant failure all seem to be missing here. IMO that limits testing, upgrades on the run, and frustrates any attempts at total recovery.
Where in the world is your blue gum Kraft mill like this proposal up and going as your pilot for both builders and operators. How good are these latest mills on switching feed stocks and other changeable parameters like juvenile versus aged timbers? Have we got enough softwood round the corner to blend in the breakdown process? Can we even mix the wood for starters?
What are the digesters internally coated with? Ever heard of digester rot? What about valve failures underneath the batch. Where is your nearest help as the chip piles grow again?
And what about working in the smell close up? Ever experienced a tools down over conditions?
Pinxi: Electricians and plumbers everywhere today can name their own price. Lennon’s defunct mob and Turnbull’s lot can’t save our TCA there.
There is a good read on TCF background studies here
http://archive.greenpeace.org/toxics/reports/tcf/tcf.html#iii) Modification of the Bleach
About planning a shutdown
http://www.engineerlive.com/asiapacific-engineer/materials-solids-handling/13278/innovative-refurbishment-prolongs-pulp-digester-life.thtml
Hardwood cooking pot design see APPITA etc.
http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=16450458
A small mod mill in local pines
http://www.visy.com.au/pulpandpaper/?id=275
Like Pinxie, I have also been to the Bordeaux region, once on a study tour and later as a tourist. I would make these comments:
1. There are basically two monocultures in this region: maritime pine and wine grapes. Both cover very large areas and both have a similar “monotony” in terms of landscape impact, if you are worried about this sort of thing. Being both a forester and a wine-lover, as well as being interested in land use and history, I found the region fascinating and beautiful, witht the vineyards and the pine forests setting each other off.
2. The pine forests were originally planted about 200 yrs ago for the single purpose of sand dune stabilisation. Later they were used for production of naval stores for the shipbuilding industry, and later still became a valuable source of timber. Today they are managed for the multiple purposes of soil conservation (dune stabilisation), recreation, wildlife habitat and timber production and are a highly valued aspect of the local environmental and economic scene.
3. Many pine forests in the Bordeaux region are privately owned by small land owners, who work together in cooperatives when selling their timber to sawmills or pulpmill. Generations of people have grown up to accept forestry as part of their life, no different from wine-gowing or beef production. Trees are planted, husbanded and then cut down and replanted. I found this one of the most interesting aspects of life in Europe, comparing it to Australia where there is this prevailing view amongst environmentalists that there is something almost evil about growing trees for timber.
4. Yes, the pulpmill was smelly, as were pulpmills I visited many years ago in Canada and the USA. If I lived in the Tamar Valley, I would bekeen to know how this aspect of the proposed mill was to be mitigated.
However, the suggested disastrous impacts of a pulpmill on wine growing and tourism in Tasmania appear to me to be way over the top. I think they can rightly be classified as scare tactics. I am reminded of the dire predictions of the greenies in WA when the first woodchipping operations began in 1975. Not only would this lead to “desertification” of the karri forest, it would result in salinity, extinction of flora and fauna,mobilisation of coastal sand dunes, destruction of local agricultural industries and loss of jobs. None of these things eventuated, although many jobs were lost when the industry was curtailed by the current government for political, not environmental reasons.
Roger Underwood
The processes and chemical reactions used in pulp mills can produce unpleasant odours emissions, particularly from sulphides. This is well understood and whilst not yet completely eliminated technology and design are very close.
“Ensis is currently in development of odour management techniques, and have had much recent success in this field. The Environmental Protection Agency hopes to have eliminated plant odours in Australia within the next few years, and in light of recent developments, this goal is clearly in sight.” http://www.ensisjv.com/ResearchCapabilitiesAchievements/PulpandPaperProcessingandProducts/OdourManagement/tabid/263/Default.aspx
The Bell Bay Pulp Mill will be the first mill in the world to use not only one but two levels of backup, thereby reducing odour risks to an international best practice benchmark.
The Bell Bay Pulp Mill’s odour controls will be better than any other mill in the world, and the likelihood of unpleasant odour events occurring is extremely low.
Pinki’s comment that when she visited the Bordeaux region she experienced smell was a concern raised by the Tasmanian Wine industry in an recent submission claimed that “Smell to deter cellar door sales.”
Yet the smell did not deter the three 3 million tourists that visit Bordeaux annually, similarly the comment on heavy industry mirrors the Tamar Wine Region that has been established in recent years, well after Comalco Aluminium smelter established in 1950s, the Temco metal alloy plant and neighbouring two export wood chip plants operating since the 1970’s and a power station.
There have been many myths about the pulp mill, the impact on the wine industry just one of them. Why not check out the Myth Buster presentations at http://www.tca.org.au
Pinxi
Again why the dome and gloom, but then again it appears that the Bordeaux wine growers see no problem in coexisting with loggers, 800 million litres of fine red wine a year indicates a fair hunk of industry, so guess they don’t share your negative outlook.
Just in passing Tassie has achieved its conservation goal 47% of our forest cover is set aside for conservation values. and the WWF only calls for 10%
Perhaps the most obvious myth with the TCA and large pulp mills is that they are just so great for the natural environment when at best they are just crude wood chip steaming plants the use lots of chemicals to help breakdown the lignin’s and bleach the pulp.
Re using all the dirty brown waste liquor produced in the process is the tricky bit.
Cinders has avoided commenting on any likely difficulties in making hardwood pulp from the range of eucalypt species likely to be used around Gunns from various bits of Tasmania. And that’s apart from the greater issue of why most good hardwood types should not be retained as a matured timber source.
IMHO pulp driven forest operations eventually become the only driving force in the industry and the good pickings all disappear into brown paper bags and boxes.
On the Canberra Times front page today is an exclusive” Tiwi Islands logging under fire“
“Australia’s biggest agribusiness investment funds manager could face fines of more than 6 million for alleged illegal land clearing after a federal investigation of its woodchip operations on the Tiwi islands”
Although the “Great illegal logging swindle” thread fizzed from lack of support one way or another we are still at odds in Canberra over policy up north. Seems the previous Environment Minister Robert Hill gave approval in 2001 for the subsidiary of an Adelaide group to clear 26,000 ha of eucalypt forest on Melville Island to establish quick growing acacia.
Rosslyn Beeby’s article is in direct contrast to the Gov’s $200m to reduce illegal forestry in SE Asia. I would suggest it remains a battle of wits through to the election as to what we end up with.
It’s been my view throughout these debates that Tasmania’s Island forestry in particular could continue to be the back stop for high quality hardwood timber supply to the mainland domestic demand. Residues only should go to particle board and pulp projects.
Fast growing species like plantation pines can easily fill our demand for paper.
Did any one see the last episode of Grand Design? It’s a must watch program for prospective owner builders. The most recent project was a Scandinavian Co kit home that featured a Finnish slow growing pine log structure throughout. Harvest methods shown there could give us a clue in modern forestry for sustainable home building with an emphasis on slow grown resources down the track.
http://www.channel4.com/4homes/ontv/grand-designs/houses/K/kent.html
Finland Spruce home info
“Unique to Erlund House is our patented wall structure
which consists of a tight double tongue and groove log
wall, the bearing structure of the house, protected by
an external panelled wall made from heart sawn 28 mm
thick spruce panels. Between them is blown
ekovilla insulation – natural cellulose fibre
insulation, made from recycled paper creating a totally
natural breathable log wall structure with excellent
thermal insulation values”
http://www.erlund-house.com/loghouses.php
Gavin,
You have once again displayed your lack of knowledge of forestry operations. It is not the industry that determines the end product, but the forest itself. If the log quality in the forest is variable then it is variable. Some logs will be of sawlog quality and others will be of pulp log quality, its as simple as that. Even after a sawlog has been cut out of a log there will be a residual log of generally lower quality, often pulp quality. These logs cannot be graded as something that they are not.
Your continued claim that the forestry industry is woodchip driven is either ignorant or mischievious. No forestry agency or private forest grower will send logs to the woodchip mill if it is of sawlog quality, the financial returns for sawlog dictate this.
Indeed your comment on scandinavian harvesting methods clearly demonstrates your complete and utter lack of knowledge of Australian forest ecology. To implement such harvesting methods would do nothing other than highgrade the forest leaving trees of little vigour, with a poor ability to regenerate. Just because it works in one environment does not make it so in another. I would not ask the scandinavians to adopt the silvicultural methods that have been developed for Australian forests nor would scandinavian foresters ask the same of Australian foresters.
The scandinavian resource is slow grown, with between 90 and 120 days growing season per year, albeit with long growing days in the summer.Their sawlog resource grows at a similar annual rate to our native cypress pine, Callitris glaucophylla, with a rotation length of between 90 and 120 years.
It surely has been a while since you worked in a pulp mill otherwise you would know that the softwoods such as pinus radiata, with their longer fibre lengths, are used to produce different paper products than hardwoods, with their short fibre lengths, such as E. regnans or plantation species such as E. globulus. The residues from harvesting these species do indeed go into pulp production, as you have suggested, and the high quality E.regnans sawlog does indeed get exported to the mainland, you might know it from its trade name of Tassie Oak.
So why is it okay for the Fins to use their forests but we mustn’t cut any of our trees down? Ditto for the Swedes, the Norwegians, the Germans, the Austrians and the French.
” So why is it okay for the Fins to use their forests but we mustn’t cut any of our trees down? Ditto for the Swedes, the Norwegians, the Germans, the Austrians and the French.” – Boxer
I’m not so familiar with the forest industry , but indeed there are also confrontations in Scandinavia between environmentalist, NGOs vs the forest industry. However, as Boxer mentioned , it’s quite accepted.
Most confrontations are about cutting of ancients forests in northern areas in Sweden and Finland ( Lapland). The big ” enemy” here seems to be the company, Stora Enso.
I must also point out that Sweden has the world’s biggest area of FSC- certified forests.
Ann: We don’t hear much on spruce growing or harvesting downunder.
I cut down over a dozen around my home over a few years. The last only days ago was killed by drought.
To me it’s odd wood light enough for ships masts but stronger it seems than more common exotics used for timber here. I guess Sweden and like countries are lucky to have the resource.
Hi Boxer re: no contest, 2 quick draw responses:
1. their policies are generally already more progressive and an integral part of the mindset (ie the gap between public, private & individual views is smaller than it is in Aust)
2. in France Bordeaux region, it’s all pine plantation on drained land. No contest as there’s no natural spots there at threat that are worth saving, it’s just an economic resource nothing more and so bland that it looks just as good cut down as it goes upright.
And besides, unlike many Aussies, they seem better educated about paper & wood products coming from trees not by mysterious magic & they all want their Ikea furniture. As Ann said there is contest where valuable or old spots remain.
Re: Europe in general, you hit on an important point. In most cases they had to lose it, or almost lose it, before they brought in strict environmental policies. It’s a classic. They’re ahead of us in environmental transformative/destruction/change (but not in mammal extinctions!) so we can learn from their mistakes, ideally before we repeat them. (Recall I’m not anti-logging)
Timber jack: what doom & gloom? I made observations & suggested that we need to consider the broader contributory historical & sociopolitical factors before drawing narrow conclusins & trying to extrapolate/transplant to an entirely different set of conditions.
Pinxi
I do recall you are not anti-logging from previous comments. However to take this:
“their policies are generally already more progressive and an integral part of the mindset”
I agree on the second part, because it demonstrates that Europeans know that resources come from somewhere. Cheese comes from cows, goats and sheep. A point you make in your second paragraph.
I don’t agree on the first part. Australians still cling to their cultural cringe, and they hold to the perception of Western Europe, and particularly the Nordic countries, as moral superpowers. The forest science employed in European countries is the same body of knowledge as that employed in Australia. The same literature, journals, everything. If you walk in the iconic German Black Forest, you will find that it is clear-felled and regenerated in discrete blocks, very similar to the way Australian wet sclerophyll forests are (or were) managed. Almost all of Sweden’s forests were felled to smelt steel and what you see now is the regrowth from that period of 19th century industrialisation. This regrowth forest estate would be “high conservation value” national park or conservation reserve in Australia.
I was struck by a sight on the main road between Salzburg and Bad Gastein (a ski resort town) in Austria. A clear-fell logging operation was using a cable extraction system to take logs from a 45 degree slope to a log landing on the side of the road. The landing was against the bitumen road in full view. No placards, no hysterics, all on a tourist route between a major sophisticated city and it’s winter playground.
We have exotic species pine plantations only 30 years old that can’t be logged in WA because of the public outcry. And the previous generation resisted the establishment of those pines being planted in the first place. All I ask for is one rational reason for this.
Europeans seem to enjoy wood. You see more wood used throughout construction and interior design in Europe than in this country. Structural laminated timber beams a metre deep in industrial buildings, and ceilings in restaurants panelled with wood. We’ve become almost embarrassed by the use of wood and go for plastic, metal and opaque paints (preferably over nice cheap rainforest timber).
Boxer like Pinxi adds to our EU picture.
Re logging for the Grand Design house program I thought we saw a machine with a mechanical arm that grabbed according to thickness of the beam required. It cut and stripped the trunk then lopped according to a predetermined length from the house design. No waste at any stage seemed the order of the day
Peter: You win it’s time I gave up because I most likely have forgotten more than some have had time to absorb. It’s nearly 50 years since I started in the Pulp & Paper industry and began learning trades in support of a dozen machine lines with as many different web making processes.
Some of my work early on was directly involved with research teams building secret programs on continuous digesters for hardwood pulps and a black liquor recovery reactor that went into “spontaneous” combustion under extreme conditions. This plant at the time when scaled up a decade or so later employed the biggest air compressor ever delivered to the southern hemisphere.
But there were many other interesting projects that involved feed-stocks, fills, finishes and fuels as we experimented with production possibilities and plant capacities. Believe me we tried pulp from everywhere in various locations both sides of Bass Strait. For pure experience I went along to an interview a APM’s old Broadford mill so I could learn how they made straw into pulp and board just in case other supplies like radiata went sour for local paper making.
I sometime refer to the heady days when one modern 1960’s factory in Melbourne could wrap the equator with a 12’ wide roll of throw away paper every few hours. So could our main interstate rivals. Our no 3 was approaching 3000’ /min on facials.
As an industry group technology was fairly evenly distributed between companies and sites. Innovation came through better local engineering design rather than lab craft. As this went on my involvement rapidly turned to continuous measurement and control systems. NATA certified labs ran the QA within plants. Mutual recognition was important across the industry. See APPITA for standards.
Most technicians then also understood and protected assets like forestry with the same zeal as finished products.
It bothers me Peter practical environment issues lie outside the independent NATA concepts. The RFA goes a long way in building a final framework but as I see it we still lack the independent umpires at every level of operations.
Take a look at the Tiwi Is project as featured in Times2. Internal self assessment on the ground went astray from day one.
National maps of the day were not that poor. When I retired in 96 our communication licensing teams in Canberra depended on them in daily routines. Checking vegetation was something I did on a regular basis for our long range links and coastal hops. Old military maps were often good enough in the absence of newer Nat Maps. When in doubt I asked the locals.
Gavin,
I accept your knowledge of the pulp and paper industry and f the inovations that were introduced when you were a part of it. Indeed as you have mentioned on this blog many innovations in pulp and paper production and environmental measures could be attributed to teams that you yourself participated in. What concerns me is that you have adopted the mindset that all innovation ceased when you retired and that there is no longer any drive for better environmental performance.
Ten years ago I toured a modern pulp and paper mill in Finland that at time set the standard for environmental performance. The Finns were adamant that they could and would improve on that benchmark. The design for the Bell Bay mill is a direct decendant of that mill and the lessons learnt.
Of note is that at that time the pulp mills here in Australia were still using what the Finns termed old and dirty technology. Today we have a proposal for a mill that is a quantum leap forward in design and application and you do nothing but criticise it whilst providing vignettes from your glory days. We all know what the technology and environmental standards were in the 1960’s. Thankfully those days are long gone, well over 40 years ago and the world has moved forward, especially pulp mill design. To listen to you and other mill opponents one could be excused for thinking that the environmental standards have not progressed in the past 40 years, when all the evidience is to the contrary.
Oh! and by the way, that Finnish pulp and paper mill that I toured had one paper machine that was producing 60 km of high quality coated paper per hour each and ever hour, 24 hours per day, on a nine metre wide web. It did hold the world record for production, but was surpassed by a Norwegian mill at that time. Ten years down the track and I would be very, very surprised if that sort of performance had not been surpassed.
Peter: Two points I made on design items that seems to be missing
1) Effluent recycling,
2) pilot plant on eucalypt feed, alternatively in house R & D on the initial run, thinking both were necessary in future paper making
Other points were doubts on the capacity of existing forests to meet expectations without excessive transportation, alternatively splitting processing capacity via several sites ie smaller mills dedicated to particular forests, NE & NW where one would become the pilot for the other as time went by.
To my knowledge none the above were properly presented in the lead up to the RPDC.
Given there seemed little opposition to Hampshire from the early days still I’m mystified why that proposal never got a look in.
Peter: The only mindset I have relates to the closure of old businesses as markets and technology move. Another place I called on was the Smorgon Melbourne operation. After the paper war it went too as AMCOR defeated APPM in the battle for fine office product supremacy. Like steel, pulp and paper making here took a beating.
Let’s ask this question, was that in part about pulp and hardwood resources? Another question, is Gunns big enough to stand clear in this mob?
http://www.green.net.au/boycott/archive/amcor2.htm
A good technician worries about all things that may eventually stop production.
Sure; it was a dirty business. Also ownership of R & D is more critical to the locals than their resource in the end.
Gavin brings back memories of the Native forest Networks boycott every thing web site, I think the activist in charge went of to the FSC and his brother the Wilderness Society, the current coordinator is deep in the southern forests trying to weld protest power or is that in a senator’s office as a tax payer funded staffer.
If you look carefully enogh on the boycott woodchipping reams of web pages these activists were advocating plantations on cleared agricultural land and the establishment of a pulp industry that didn’t produce nasties in the environment. Now we has the super clean ECF pulp mill proposed using a wood source from both plantation and regrowth low conservation value forest, seems the same people and their mates at RAN are demanding a boycott.
You might like to check what these people did to the Tasmanian economy back in the early to mid 1990s at http://www.ipa.org.au/files/review51-1%20Tasmanias%20Green%20Disease.pdf
t
Trust cinders to miss the fundamentals of my argument about a period of our P & P history where mills closed and others got their resource. BTW folks some Melbourne machines ran on waste paper.
I recalled Smorgon was one after my previous post. My interest then was about the fate of Burnie in particular and I was long gone from the industry then.
Salvage played a major part in our old philosophy. Papermakers at Burnie had a collection of bits from war time England. Bombed out factories were sometimes rebuilt elsewhere. Upgrades were a big part of the industry world wide as I’ve stated over and over. Watch out when that stops.
The TCA is quite light on the local R & D concept as the background to their new mill.
This notion of Gavin’s that native woods should only be for high value timber is a lot like running cattle for the sole purpose of producing rump steaks. So what do we do with the forequarters, the ribs and the mincemeat?
The same applies to native forests, what do we do with the bent stems? More importantly, a well stocked stand of young regenerated eucalypts will have from 1000 to 4000 poles/hectare, but there is only enough room on a hectare for about 100 high quality sawlogs. So what do we do with the other 3,900 stems? If we leave them in the forest it is absolutely certain that there will be no large trees for 400 years or more.
So until the green movement can provide a market for bent and deficient stems then the greatest value adding process is still woodchip (mincemeat).
The interesting thing about the Swedish certification under the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is that all those forests are “native regrowth” forests just like the majority of Australian native forest. So why did the FSC allow the Australian greens to interfere with the Australian certification process to the point where our native forests were effectively excluded?
The irony is that this favouring of planted forests only flew in the face of all the time tested principles of forestry best practice. As Englishman Raymond Tabor said in ‘Traditional Woodland Crafts’,
“Good woodsmen rarely planted trees, they had no need, for in regularly managed woodlands oaklings grew and odd gaps could be filled by plashing (air layering from retained coppice shoots)”.
He also pointed out that,
“Seedlings often appear not quite where one would wish, in which case use a spade and move them! Oaklings and young hazel are usually rare, for squirrels, mice and pheasents account for many of their large seeds. So do what woodmen always did: collect a pocket full of seeds and heel them in as you walk around the wood”.
This is precisely the methodology my own father used when he purchased a completely cleared farm in 1942. And what he produced was a multi aged, multi-species “native forest” with the full original suite of wet forest mosaics.
And the green movement, to their enduring shame, have gone out of their way to restrict our access to markets, in the name of intergenerational equity no less.
Ian,All big Swdish forest industries and pulp mills are FSC-certified. A link here:
http://www.sca.com/en/About_SCA/SCA_in_Brief/
This from one of the big, global companies ( The link in English).
Perhaps as Boxer mentioned why there ain’t so many protest about the forestry is beacuse the forestry is FSC-certificated and much of the Swedish economy is based on forestry, like retirement funds etc. It’s our ” green gold”
This link in English might be useful:
http://www.sca.com/en/Products/Forests/
In regards to FSC certification and the role of green politics, Finnish forests are about 75% privately owned. My understanding is that private forest ownership is also high amongst other Scandinavian countries. Such a high level of participation in the forest industry, either directly or indirectly, amongst the general population accounts for a very large deal of political influence.
The greens are simply unable to gain the kind of political traction in regards to forestry issues in those countries as they have here in Australia where the majority of production forests are publicaly owned.
The real issue is, how does an internationally recognised forest accreditation scheme come to have one rule for European and North American forests and another, completely different one, for Australian forests?
The only forests that could get FSC certification in Australia were plantations, not native (ie naturally regenerated) forests.
This is quite contrary to the underlying concepts in the quote from Tabor above, and consistent with all notions of good forest management since Evelyne was published 300 years ago – that actually having to plant trees is a sign of failed forestry practice. Planting trees is what urban punters and tax dodgers do. Sustainable foresters regenerate as they work through their rotation, from the species at hand.
Those who do not understand this have no role to play in sustainable forest management. They are the problem, not the solution.