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Environment Forest Ecosystems Forest Industries Forest Management Forest Products Greenhouse Gases NAFI Submissions Policy and Politics Renewable Energy Sustainability |
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The Future of the Resource IndustriesIn nearly 40 years of working life, I have seen a massive change in the image and acceptance of the resource industries (farming, forestry, fishing and mining) in Australian society.When I started work in the 1950s, these industries were seen as the backbone of Australia and people who worked in them were, by and large, respected and listened to in political and media circles. Today, we are being viewed more and more as exploiters and destroyers of our "pristine wilderness". The resource industries do not enjoy the standing, particularly amongst urban people and the current generation of school children, that we did twenty or thirty years ago and some politicians have come to believe that they can exploit this change in sentiment to pick up the few votes that are often required to win the key marginal seats which determine the outcome of Australian elections. As a consequence, the leadership and associations of resource industries are having to learn some very hard lessons, develop new programs and tactics and put time and money into projects that they would never have envisaged twenty years ago. In the mid 1980s, there were a series of inquiries into the forest industries in Australia, some conducted by the Federal government and some by various State governments. Virtually all of the inquiries were broadly supportive of industry, although they pointed to areas where management could be significantly improved. However, what alarmed the forest industries is that, by and large, the politicians took little or no notice of the inquiry outcomes and proceeded to close areas of forests that the inquiries had specifically said should be allowed to be continued to be harvested on a long-term sustainable basis. These closures were clearly politically motivated and one did not have to be Einstein to see that, if the trend continued, all native forests would be closed - at a cost of billions of dollars to the economy and tens of thousands of jobs. Industry's initial reaction was disbelief. People said that no- one would deliberately and unnecessarily put people out of work in the hope of gaining some political advantage elsewhere. I think the industry hung somewhat tenuously to this belief until the largest industrial project ever proposed for this country, the Wesley Vale Pulp Mill, was rejected on quite arbitrary and politically based grounds. All of a sudden, we realised we had a huge problem on our hands. If anyone doubts that these closures were politically motivated, I suggest you obtain a copy of the Labor in Power TV series from the ABC which was broadcast after the 1993 Federal election or read some of the memoirs or biographies of the then environment minister, Mr Graham Richardson. Forestry's next step was to try to send a message to the public that we were doing the right thing, that we were important, that we employed a lot of people and that we were not being given a fair go. This led to a fairly expensive round of TV and press advertising that was helpful, but clearly was not doing the job. When I saw the National Farmers' Federation taking out one page ads in support of their position on the Wik decision, I had a dreadful feeling of deja vu from the forestry debate of about 1988-1989. In a mood of considerable alarm, we then embarked on two directions that have stood us in reasonable stead ever since. Firstly, we commenced a program of very detailed professional public attitude surveys and analysis. Secondly, we realised that if anti development, anti industry minority groups could convince politicians that they could influence outcomes through a few votes in marginal seats, we could try to do the same. I would like to now explore both of these developments and then sum up where I think the debate is headed over the next few years. The public attitude results were initially alarming. Most Australians, particularly the city dwellers, did not believe our message of sustainable forest management and neither did they believe the State Government forest management agencies were doing their job. We were all seen as having a vested interest in resource exploitation so our message of sustainable long-term management with regeneration of all areas fell on deaf ears, particularly amongst the teachers and the school kids. Also, we learned that we had been trying to tackle the issue with a lot of science and logic, but achieving no real meeting of the minds because the issue of forestry for most people was a simple emotional one. People want to know that the forests of Australia are safe and they want to hear it from someone that they trust. Developing that message and having it presented by individuals and organisations that are generally trusted in the community has been the essence of our program ever since. We actively promoted a major inquiry in the industry by the Resource Assessment Commission leading to the development of the National Forest Policy and now the negotiation of a series of Regional Forest Agreements based on intensive scientific and socio-economic studies. This whole process has taken six to eight years and required a major political commitment and significant resources by governments. The outcome is still far from certain. Nevertheless, none of this would have happened without a strong network of people in rural Australia in many marginal seats who are prepared to be part of a national network in support of the industry. These people have been most visible in the three truck blockades of Parliament House where whole communities camped out for a week or more. Many of them are active every week through their local media, working with local government, regional development committees, calling on their politicians, organising industry tours and providing social and economic data to public servants. Through this network, we have developed a strong group of Federal backbenchers and ministers who are well briefed on forestry issues and who are prepared to lobby strongly on behalf of the industry in their electorate. It is this group that has provided the political impetus to persuade the politicians to take difficult decisions to implement the new National Forest Policy Statement. I firmly believe that the moment we stop doing public attitude testing, finding out what people want to know and how to address it or we drop the community based political linkage, the whole debate will rapidly regress to where it was a decade ago. I should emphasise at this point that a community based network is not and should not be a party political one. It should focus wholly and solely on the merits of the forest policies and decisions of government and opposition and avoid the more extreme left and right wing splinter groups like the plague. Turning now to where we are headed in the future. Firstly, I think we are getting to the stage where the management systems in place will stand up to virtually any scrutiny. They have to be based on:
A reasonable public access information system has now been set up for forestry by ourselves, through other associations and, more importantly in the last year or so, through a very comprehensive Internet site which is now receiving about 50,000 visits a month, principally from people involved in the education system, students, teachers, etc. Looking further ahead, we want to reach a situation where an independent respected body is prepared to attest that the forests of Australia are being well and sustainably managed and say it in terms that are quite definitive and unequivocal. To achieve this, we will need performance criteria and a process of independent audit and accreditation. The development of these criteria and the process of audit and accreditation is now occupying a great deal of our time. Many of you will be familiar with the International Standards Organisation series ISO 9000 which is used as a basis for quality control assessments. There is also the ISO 14000 series which is the basis for meeting environmental standards. ISO does not set the standards. ISO provides a framework for assessment so that an independent audit can determine whether performance criteria are being met. The Australian industry, along with other forest producing countries are now working together in an ISO Working Group to develop an environmental management system which will suit our industry and which will provide the basis for independent audit and accreditation. The process of developing this in an international and independent framework is slow, but we have made quite a lot of progress in the last year or so. I would hope to see an ISO system being, at least, trialled in Australia in the next 12 months. Quite separately, sustainability performance criteria have to be developed for sustainable management performance and there are a number of bodies addressing this issue around the world. We are currently working with some of these groups to try and take very general international criteria and develop them in a way that makes them sensible and relevant for the various forest types that we encounter in this country. Again, this is a slow process but, as the Regional Forest Agreements that I discussed earlier are completed, we should be able to have some management performance guidelines as a basis for independent assessment. I know that the fisheries industry has been approached by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) to endorse the Fisheries Stewardship Council just as we have been approached by the WWF to support the Forest Stewardship Council. The Stewardship Council are trying to use the buyers and marketers of the products to bring pressure to bear on the producers to join their schemes and obtain accreditation in this manner. I would have to say that, from our point of view, the verdict is "not in" on the Forest Stewardship Council. We have some major concerns, however, in relation who sets its policies, the consistency of its approach between different countries, whether it can be used as a non tariff trade barrier or subject to international pressure group manipulation. To sum up, if you ask me where we want to be in three years time, I would say we would still need a strong public awareness communication program and a strong community network, but it would be complemented by an internationally linked and independent accreditation process which can reliably and confidently tell Australians that their forests are safe. |
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