Ministerial Release
Browns forest fictions
2nd April, 2007
Senator Brown's reported comments today that regeneration burns in Tasmania's forests take place in order to "prevent regeneration" show just how outlandish the Greens' claims about Australia's forest industry are becoming.
Regeneration burns in a tiny percent of Australia's native forests - typically only around 2,000 hectares per annum - are exactly that: burns to regenerate the forest.
In Australia, we plant at least twice as many trees as we harvest - our forest estate is growing by some 70,000 hectares per year.
Almost 22 million hectares of Australia's forest is permanently protected - the fourth highest in the world, despite having only four percent of the world's forests.
In Australia, we are reforesting, not deforesting.
Australia's forestry sector is the only carbon positive sector of the economy.1
To close this sector, as Senator Brown wants to do, would actually result in higher carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.
It's about time Senator Brown acknowledged the truth of Australia's renewable, environmentally friendly forestry industry.
Instead of indulging in over-blown hyperbole ("napalm", "mushroom clouds", "holocausts"), Senator Brown should deal in science, and in fact.
The truth is Senator Brown has no facts and he has no science.