The federal government has sought to allay community concerns about tree farms – which have increased by 20 per cent in five years in Western Australia to reach almost 400,000 hectares – releasing a report on the impact of timber plantations on farming communities in which they are located.
Releasing the report, federal forestry minister Eric Abetz said just 0.5 per cent of farming land in Australia was occupied by tree farms.
Critics have highlighted the localised impact of plantations, particularly in regions such as the Great Southern, where a substantial portion of farming land is now used for plantations.
They have also challenged the tax breaks enjoyed by the plantation sector, which are currently under review.
Western Australia’s total timber plantation area increased by around 20 per cent from 2000 to 2005, according to the report, Australia’s Plantations 2006, by the Federal Bureau of Rural Sciences.
More than 377,000ha in WA were dedicated to plantation timber last year, up from 314,000 in 2000, representing a total 188 per cent increase from the 131,000ha dedicated to timber in 1994.
With WA’s hardwood plantations established in the 1990s reaching harvest age, log and woodchip exports from the Bunbury and Albany ports are widely expected to increase.
The vast majority of the increase has been in blue gum plantations, which make up 61 per cent of the nation’s hardwood plantations.
In WA, blue gum plantations have increased by more than seven times since 1994 but by only 27 per cent since 2000.
The waning of this increase is expected to continue as more sites established in the 1990s are harvested, making those sites available for replanting.
Across the nation, the total timber plantation area increased to nearly 1.74 million ha in 2005, with more than 57 per cent of those plantations privately owned.
