LETTER TO THE EDITOR

16 March 2000

Mr McArthur should take more care to check the validity of logging industry public relations material before he publishes it under his own name. His arrogant, misinformed and personal attack upon Mr Chris Tipler from the Otway Ranges Environment Network only serves to inflict Kennett style damage upon the Federal Liberal Party (GA 14/3/200).

Mr Macarthur claims that "the harvesting of forest coupes takes place primarily for quality sawlogs which have much more economic value than woodchips [which] are an inevitable by-product of harvesting sawlogs." Yet statistics prepared for the West Regional Forest Agreement on behalf of his own government reveal that only 22% of native trees from the entire West Region are made into sawn timber. Just 2% of that timber can be used in appearance grade applications.

This data also shows that the sawn timber component of the logging industry is running at an annual $2.5 million loss. The only way the logging industry can survive is through woodchipping the vast majority of clearfelled trees from our native forests using automated processing machinery and a minimum of waged labour.

Reputable scientists speaking at the December ‘Water Summit’ in Geelong agreed that clearfell logging reduces both water yield and quality. Why does Mr McArthur disregard established fact on this issue? As Mr Tipler points out economic losses incurred by ratepayers and industries from logging damage in water catchments will have a long term impact upon regional development.

Both the State and Federal Governments are obviously very nervous about the water issue. Why else has there been no logging in any of Geelong’s catchments this season? I challenge Mr McArthur to stand in front of his constituents and declare that he is happy for Geelong’s water catchments to be logged. Then we’ll all get to see where the axe falls.

Serena O'Meley
Geelong Community Forum Inc.