The Greens will end native forest logging in NSW to protect endangered wildlife, reduce climate pollution, and expand our shared national park estate.
Our public native forests are special places, cherished and cared for over thousands of years, deserving of our protection. Home to koalas, greater gliders, and vital waterways, they give us unique places to walk, ride, camp, and connect with nature, and each other.
Left standing, healthy, mature forests are our greatest natural defence against climate change and catastrophic bushfires, locking away tonnes of carbon and maintaining moist microclimates that resist fire.
But Labor and Coalition governments have allowed the Forestry Corporation to keep logging them, even while its hardwood division runs at a $32 million dollar per year loss. And it’s your money.
Instead of using public money to destroy nature, we can help timber workers and towns build a future in plantations, local processing, forest care and tourism.
It is time to end native forest logging.
The Greens will:
- Immediately end native forest logging across all public land in NSW.
- Establish the Great Koala National Park and the Great Southern Forest, connecting 1.2 million hectares of land and turning it into protected wildlife corridors.
- Legislate protections for habitat of endangered wildlife, including koalas, greater gliders, and other native animals
- Deliver a fully funded just transition package for forestry workers, mill staff, and haulage contractors, securing long-term regional jobs.
- Protect 30% of NSW land and water by 2030 by permanently transferring state forests into the protected national park estate and establishing new protected areas across NSW
- Partner with First Nations communities to co-develop forest management and land stewardship through funded ranger and restoration programs.
- Open and upgrade native forests for community recreation, ensuring affordable, accessible spaces for camping, bushwalking, and mountain biking.
Sign the petition to end native forest logging and protect our forests for everyone.
Saving forests is climate action
Forests are the largest storage banks for carbon on land. Older trees are much more efficient at capturing dangerous carbon dioxide than younger trees.
Native forest logging in NSW emits approximately 3.6 million tonnes of carbon every year. This is equivalent to the annual emissions of 840,000 cars and is worth $2.7 billion in climate mitigation.
Managing old growth forests and regenerating logged and regrowing forests is essential to reducing the impacts of climate change. Older forests are more resistant to fire, floods and drought and provide landscape resilience to the impacts of climate change.
Ending native forest logging is climate action NSW can take right now, and it saves the state money.
Immediately end all native forest logging on public land
The Greens will immediately end the logging of public native forests. It is too late for a long phase out period of native forest logging. The damage has reached critical levels that threaten the ongoing integrity of these forests.
The shortfalls in harvestable trees and the increasing threat of extreme fires means that native forest logging will inevitably end but we cannot afford an unplanned and catastrophic end for native forests.
We now have the science, economic and social evidence to prove that native forest logging is a profitless and destructive industry that threatens every aspect of the environment and society.
Rehabilitate, regenerate and actively manage our public native forests creating new jobs and regional opportunities
The damage that has been done to native forests over the past 200 years of exploitation must be repaired. Our public native forest estate is in poor condition and needs rehabilitation, regeneration and active management to ensure it is healthy and productive into the future.
Our most iconic forest dependent species have been pushed to the brink of extinction. Koalas, Greater and Yellow bellied Gliders, Sooty, Masked and Powerful Owls, Quolls and Platypus are only just hanging on. We need healthy forests to turn this extinction crisis around.
Actively managed, our forests will be clear of invasive species and resistant to fire. These new forest jobs need to be done by a dedicated workforce that can serve as alternative employment opportunities for displaced workers from the native forestry sector.
Protected and managed forests will draw tourists and new economic potential for communities and diversify local economies.
Fund the transition for workers and industry to a 100% sustainable model
Workers and communities that are involved in native forest logging need a plan that provides a secure and viable pathway away from native forest logging.
The Greens will fund a transition that ensures a job for job guarantee so that workers are not abandoned by the collapse of the native forest logging industry.
Expansion of the plantation estate will increase revenue and create more jobs than the roughly 1,070 currently employed by the native forest industry, with more than 1,200 new regional jobs in forest restoration, management and tourism.
Our plan will include:
- A multi-million dollar structural adjustment package for worker redundancy top-ups, retraining, capital buybacks for contractors and cancellation of current wood supply agreements
- Investment in regional economic diversification, including public manufacturing hubs for plantation softwood, hemp and bamboo
- An expansion of the plantation forest estate on marginal agricultural land
Partner with First Nations communities to co-develop forest management and land stewardship
The Australian landscape was managed sustainably for tens of thousands of years prior to the arrival of Europeans and the over exploitation of natural resources. First Nations cultural knowledge, custodianship and sovereignty should be recognised through co-developed models of land ownership, shared decision-making and joint management of our forests.
Ecological and social outcomes are always improved when land rights and management are returned to First Nations people. These programs, including permanent First Nations ranger programs, cultural cool-fire practices and ecological regeneration, should receive ongoing and dedicated funding.
Open and upgrade native forests for community recreation
Native forests are tremendous contributors to the health and wellbeing of NSW residents through recreational and educational outcomes. Low impact infrastructure can enable higher utilisation of native forests by increasing accessibility and amenity without interfering with the natural landscape, with affordable, accessible spaces for camping, bushwalking and mountain biking. Focussing these activities on the former public forest logging estate will take the pressure off some of our current National Park estate.
HOW THE GREENS HAVE BEEN FIGHTING FOR YOU
In parliament, it’s the Greens who have:
- Campaigned alongside forest defenders and local communities to win the Great Koala National Park
- Secured the release of documents about the privatisation of plantations
- Held Forestry Corporation responsible for the damage done to protected areas and trees during forestry operations
- Prosecuted the unprofitable and wasteful destruction of native forests for wood chip products
- Fought against native forests being burnt to produce energy in coal fired power plants
- Stood with First Nations people in asking for the cultural significance of forests to be recognised
- Joined forest defenders on the frontlines and stopped logging operations