Native forest logging in Victoria will end in December, six years earlier than previously planned, after the state government decided severe bushfires and legal campaigns had made it economically and environmentally unviable.
The announcement by the Andrews Labor government in Tuesday’s state budget follows a landmark supreme court judgment last November that the state-owned logging agency, VicForests, had broken the law by failing to protect endangered species.
It triggered a shutdown of operations that contributed to Australia’s last white paper mill, located in the Latrobe Valley, ending production of office paper in February.
Government ministers said they had brought forward a previous commitment to phase out the industry by 2030 to “deliver certainty to timber workers, sawmill operators and their communities”. They pledged an extra $200m in the budget as part of a $875m transition support package for those affected.
Conservationists celebrated the decision, which comes after decades of conflict over the destruction caused by clearfell logging. In recent years campaigners have brought more than a dozen court cases alleging loggers had breached forestry laws.
Chris Schuringa, from the Victorian Forest Alliance, said campaigners were “overjoyed by this historic announcement”.
“This is a monumental win for forests, for wildlife, for climate, and for the hard-working people who have spent countless hours surveying for endangered species, preparing evidence for court cases, lobbying, and campaigning,” she said. “Some have been fighting for this for over three decades.”
The government said bushfires, legal action and court decisions meant there were no alternative timber sources to supply the state’s mills, and there were no options for regulatory reform that could prevent further court injunctions.
It said hundreds of workers had not been able to work for months after the supreme court found VicForests had failed to protect the endangered greater glider and yellow-bellied glider.
The premier, Daniel Andrews, said the state needed a plan to support workers and their families. The transition package would help timber workers retrain and find new jobs and support businesses reliant on hardwood supply.
“It’s not good enough for us to just cross our fingers and hope for the best,” the premier said. “That’s why we’re stepping up to give these workers, and their communities, businesses and partners along the supply chain, the certainty they deserve.”
The treasurer, Tim Pallas, told reporters he felt a “great degree of sympathy” for forestry workers and communities.
“We don’t take any satisfaction in this,” he said. “The advice that we’ve got is that, legally, there will be no way through this if the courts have been used the way that they have, effectively to frustrate this industry.”
The decision means both Victoria and Western Australia will end native forest logging by next year. There are no plans to end logging in New South Wales or Tasmania.
The Australian Greens said the ban should be national. “If the Albanese government is serious about fighting climate change and protecting our environment it must now follow the lead of Victoria … and stop all native forest logging,” said the party’s forest spokesperson, Janet Rice.
But the decision was criticised by the Coalition. The federal MP for Gippsland, the Nationals’ Darren Chester, said it was a “Dan-made disaster which will devastate our communities and take a generation to recover from”.
“In my 15 years as a member of parliament I’ve never been more disgusted in a government decision than I am today,” he said.
The union representing timber workers accused the state government of failing to consult the industry and said the “gut-wrenching” decision would result in up to 1000 more short-term job losses than anticipated.
“It’s a shame that [Andrews] only governs for Melbourne, Geelong, Ballarat and Bendigo,” the CFMEU’s manufacturing division national secretary, Michael O’Connor, said. “If you’re in any other part of the state, you don’t get a look in.”
Calls for the Victorian government to quickly end native forestry have escalated since the catastrophic 2019-20 black summer bushfires, which burned more than 1.5m hectares across the state and reduced the livable habitat for dozens of threatened species by more than half.
The reduction in areas available for logging due to the fires affected the industry’s economic viability, which was already under question. VicForests reported a $54.2m loss in its last annual report.
The government said it would develop a program for the management of 1.8m hectares of land previously allocated for logging. It said this would “deliver the largest expansion to our public forests in our state’s history”.
It said an advisory panel would be established to recommend forest areas that should be protected as national parks and areas that would be suitable for other recreational uses. It would also consider opportunities for management by traditional owners.
‘Monumental day’
Sarah Rees, who has campaigned for the creation of a great forest national park, said the decision was “a win for communities, endangered species and testimony to the Andrews government’s commitment to climate change”.
She said damage from fires and logging meant the state’s forests would need investment – beyond that offered to timber workers – to back recreation plans and to restore degraded land.
Prof David Lindenmayer, an Australian National University ecologist who has worked Victoria’s forests for decades, said the decision would be good for the economy and the climate. He said its effect would be equivalent to preventing greenhouse gas emissions from 730,000 cars every year.
“A major workforce will be needed to build new tourism infrastructure, protect and then boost carbon stocks, tackle problems with exploding numbers of feral deer and develop elite fire-fighting crews to make rural communities safe,” he said.
The national campaigns director for the Wilderness Society, Amelia Young, said “living, breathing, intact forests” were the best safeguard against the climate crisis. “It’s crucial that workers and families, who have been led astray about the longevity of Victoria’s native logging industry, are properly supported,” she said.
Alana Mountain, a forest campaigner with Friends of the Earth, said it was a sensitive time for affected workers, but the announcement meant people were no longer in limbo. “This is justice for climate, forests, and humanity,” she said.
• This article was amended on 24 May 2023. An earlier version said that 1.5 hectares was destroyed in the 2019-20 summer bushfires; that should have been 1.5m hectares.
