Tasmanian rainforest Australia wants to become the first developed nation to reverse a forest's protected status on economic grounds
Unesco warns Australia over reef
Australia reef dumping plan approved
Time-lapse shows coral's secret life Watch
An Australian plan to chop down 74,000 hectares of protected Tasmanian forest for timber will be discussed at a UN cultural organisation meeting which begins on Sunday in Qatar.
The Tasmanian forest is part of a Unesco World Heritage Site, but the Australian government wants this status revoked so logging can begin.
Thousands of people in Tasmania protested against the move on Saturday.
The government says the area is degraded as it has been logged before.
If the bid succeeds, Australia would become the first developed nation to have reversed the protected status of a forest on economic grounds.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has championed the cause of the timber industry, which employs more than 66,000 people.
The opposition Greens party has labelled him a "dig it up, cut it down prime minister".
Wilderness Society spokesman Vica Bayley said: "Logging World Heritage forests is as reckless as destroying any other World Heritage site, like using the Grand Canyon as a garbage dump, knocking down the Sydney Opera House for harbourside apartments or selling the Eiffel Tower for scrap."
Another protected Australian site, the Great Barrier Reef, is also on the agenda of Unesco's World Heritage Committee meeting in Doha.
Canberra hopes to deter Unesco from downgrading the reef to "endangered status" because of pollution-linked deterioration.
Australian officials say that industrial chemical pollution levels at the reef have fallen significantly because of better agricultural and industrial practises.
However, critics say approval for a project to dump dredged sediment in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park as part of a project to create one of the world's biggest coal ports presents a serious threat to the reef. Scientists have warned that the sediment could smother or poison coral.
Unesco is also expected to reclassify other world sites as protected areas, including the Inca Trail in Peru, the Rani-ki-Vav stepwell in India and the Chauvet Cave paintings in France.
So, chopping unique forests for wood and dumping trash in the Great Barrier Reef then protesting status of both? Is there a low right wing neocons can't possibly achieve?
What's particularly crazy is that the timber companies involved don't even want the forest. They've been working with conservationists and academics for literally decades now on transitioning to sustainable forestry practices, which is both more economical and doesn't ruin the forest. Because the thing with them - and this always takes people by surprise - is that a lot of loggers end up having a great appreciation for the beauty of the places they destroy, and if you help them transition to a better model, they'll take the deal! No one BUT the Coalition wants this.
"Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too—ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring the earth." M.A.A.A
They may also take the deal because they want to still have a business model in a generation. I suspect there are fishing companies trying to seriously address fishery degradation for the same reason.
Simon_Jester wrote:They may also take the deal because they want to still have a business model in a generation. I suspect there are fishing companies trying to seriously address fishery degradation for the same reason.
That tends to help too, yeah. Avoiding PR nightmares weighs in some as well.
"Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too—ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring the earth." M.A.A.A
The other thing is that farmed forests have some advantages over old growth that usually aren't considered but the loggers out in the field HAVE to be aware of, such as better access, more consistent items harvested, and lack of protesters doing shit like spiking trees. Logging is dangerous at the best of times, reducing the risks while still bringing profit has some appeal.
A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory.Leonard Nimoy.
Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.- Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of Serenity, which sums up my feelings regarding the lawsuit discussed here.
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. - John F. Kennedy
So if the timber industries aren't interested, why the fuck is the Australian government trying to do this?
Does it follow that I reject all authority? Perish the thought. In the matter of boots, I defer to the authority of the boot-maker - Mikhail Bakunin Capital is reckless of the health or length of life of the laborer, unless under compulsion from society - Karl Marx Pollution is nothing but the resources we are not harvesting. We allow them to disperse because we've been ignorant of their value - R. Buckminster Fuller The important thing is not to be human but to be humane - Eliezer S. Yudkowsky
Nova Mundi, my laughable attempt at an original worldbuilding/gameplay project
The Abbott and Newman governments’ Great Barrier Reef report card out today shows that the good work of farmers reducing their runoff is being undermined by the big mining companies directly dumping sediment into the Reef.
“Despite welcome gains in reducing agricultural runoff, the Reef’s inshore water quality remains poor, which will only get worse with mass dredging and dumping planned for the Reef’s coastline,” Senator Larissa Waters, Australian Greens environment spokesperson, said.
“The Abbott and Newman governments are completely undermining the good work of farmers reducing their Reef runoff, by allowing the big mining companies to dump millions of tonnes of sediment directly into the Reef’s World Heritage waters.
“The notion that Minister Powell can somehow allay the World Heritage Committee’s concerns about all of the dredging and dumping set to go ahead, especially at Abbot Point, with this report about current water quality, is ridiculous.
“The Reef is facing an ‘In Danger’ listing because it is being industrialised for the big mining companies and this report does nothing to address that.
“What’s more, the Abbott government has cut $40 million in funding from the federal program to reduce agricultural runoff, Reef Rescue, and put that money into a thought bubble policy, Reef Trust, the details of which have not been worked out.
“Ripping money out of a proven program for an ill-defined experiment is bad news for the Reef.
“The Abbott and Newman governments are happy to accept extreme weather is threatening the Reef but refuse to accept that climate change is driving extreme weather, and that climate change is driven by coal exports, for which all the dredging and dumping is happening.
“It’s about time they put the Reef and the 63,000 jobs it provides ahead of the interests of the big mining companies,” Senator Waters said.
NoXion wrote:So if the timber industries aren't interested, why the fuck is the Australian government trying to do this?
To stick it to the greenies, mostly. Honestly, our current government is actively trying to stomp the left into submission. Thisis just part of it. Fucking liberals are also getting rid of the carbon tax, for another blow to them damn hippies.
"Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too—ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring the earth." M.A.A.A
”A Radical is a man with both feet planted firmly in the air.” – Franklin Delano Roosevelt
"No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism." - Sir Winston L. S. Churchill, Princips Britannia
American Conservatism is about the exercise of personal responsibility without state interference in the lives of the citizenry..... unless, of course, it involves using the bludgeon of state power to suppress things Conservatives do not like.
DONALD J. TRUMP IS A SEDITIOUS TRAITOR AND MUST BE IMPEACHED
Our previous government instituted a scheme to tax carbon emissions over a certain threshold in order to make ecologically sensible measures more attractive. It worked, too! Not the best model, plenty of big flaws, but it got our emissions down a bit and was starting a trend. And this is not a minor thing - we emit something like 1% of global CO2 emissions; we're actually quite a significant polluter and cutting back even a little will help.
They scrapped it because it was 'bad for the economy'. Now, it mostly impacted coal-related industries, especially power generation. This same government just declared coal will fuel our human progress for the next few decades, so that should tell you something about how fucking insane liberals are. This is in a country where the pipe-dream of mass solar, geothermal and wind is entirely possible because of our low population, excellent sun exposure, and fantastic areas for geothermal and wind. It's not a solution for all our energy needs but it's one the previous government was starting to explore in more depth and which our new one has basically stomped on in the name of COAL!
I'm particularly bitter about the way Australia chooses to produce its energy because my region has been embroiled in a huge struggle not with coal miners, but with coal seam -gas- mining companies. The Abbot government is all for that, too - that is in fact what Abbot Point is mostly for, to export gas to China.
"Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too—ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring the earth." M.A.A.A
For those who don't know, Australia taxed CO2 emissions with the view of eventually introducing an emissions trading scheme. Funny thing is, the Liberals kept on whining about how the "everyone else" wasn't doing it. When it was pointed out that Europe had one, and had been doing it for years, they changed it to the big polluters such as China and India aren't doing it. Problem with that is.
1. Its bull fucking shit. Both India and China introduced a tax. Before we did.
On Q & A some Liberal politician was caught out with this claim, when the host actually did his job and called him out and said "wait a minute, China has a carbon tax." Not missing a beat the fuckwit said it doesn't matter, because he will "personally guarantee China will scrap it" due to his magical powers of bullshit, aka making things up on the fly.
2. The Liberals conveniently ignore the other big polluter, our bestest buddy the United States, who actually pollutes more than India in terms of carbon emissions. At least in the Howard years, he admitted the US was a big polluter. Now it seems the Liberals don't even want to say that.
This isn't helped by the fact that a lot of Liberals including Abbott is a climate change denier. Well Abbott also has warped religious views so that's par for the course in the sense that when you believe on piece of woo, you are more likely to fall for another piece of woo. Sorry, Abbott says he is no longer a denier, but then I bet you he says he isn't homophobic either, so that doesn't mean much.
Abbott also loves to quote from a geologist (Ian Pilmer) who has shares in the mining industry who published a book "debunking" climate change. Now this geologist is an Australian with anti Creationist credentials, however he has got giant blinkers on. Because.
1. He accuses the environmental movement of having an ulterior motive, ie religious. Yes, environmentalism is the new religion. He of course doesn't realise this argument is fallacious because its an appeal to motive fallacy, he himself is also vulnerable to the same argument because of his mining stock.
2. Ian Pilmer's book had numerous scientific errors. However the one we should all be aware of his his magical formulae for calculating how warm the earth was millions of years ago, to prove climate change is bullshit. Plug in his figures and millions of years ago the Earth was cooler than absolute zero. Just let that sink in for a moment. He says the Earth was actually cooler than 0 Kelvin. Colder at a temperature where the molecules are not vibrating at all. So the particles must be moving less than not moving at all. Yes that's right, screw kinetic theory and physics.
Here is Abbott's comment on Pilmer's book. "Now not everyone agrees with Ian Plimer's position, but he is a highly credible scientist and he has written what seems like a very well-argued book refuting most of the claims of the climate catastrophists."
When you have scientific illiterates running the country, yeah we get bullshit. Now the greenies aren't much help either with their anti nuclear bullshit-some don't even want our existing nuclear reactor which produces isotopes for medical use. But at least the Greenies acknowledge climate change.
Never apologise for being a geek, because they won't apologise to you for being an arsehole. John Barrowman - 22 June 2014 Perth Supernova.
Countries I have been to - 14.
Australia, Canada, China, Colombia, Denmark, Ecuador, Finland, Germany, Malaysia, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, Sweden, USA.
Always on the lookout for more nice places to visit.
Elheru Aran wrote:Sorry, not familiar with Australian politics, but are your 'Liberals' equivalent to our Republicans, which are notably not liberal?
Because that's kind of a strange mental inversion going on there if that's the case...
Yep. Originally so named for adherence to classical liberalist doctrine in comparison to the socialist approach of the other big party, Labour - our oldest political party. Neither have stayed terribly true to their roots as our Liberals are now less classical liberal and more 'fuck you, got mine; give everything else to the mining companies' economically and 'FUCK YOU!' socially, and our Labour just chaps tend to be slightly more polite when telling you to fuck off and die in a gutter you filthy peasant.
"Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy, for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too—ready to understand heaven and earth. In everything you do, even the smallest thing, remember the chain that links them. Nothing earthly succeeds by ignoring heaven, nothing heavenly by ignoring the earth." M.A.A.A
Unesco has unanimously rejected a “feeble” Australian government bid to reopen 74,000 hectares of Tasmania’s world heritage area to logging.
No committee members defended the Australian cause as the proposal was discarded in less than ten minutes. Portugal’s delegate said accepting Australia’s request would undermine Unesco’s ability to protect natural and cultural icons.
It is the second time in a week Unesco has issued a withering rejection of Australian attempts to open world heritage sites to development. On Wednesday, the committee warned that the Great Barrier Reef could be placed on a list of threatened sites because of Queensland’s approval of plans to dump material dredged from coal ports inside the park.
World heritage expert Alec Marr, who was part of a delegation of green groups in Doha, said: “The World Heritage Committee saw through the deception of the Australian government’s efforts here, and the high quality science and professionalism of the advisory bodies was exemplary.”
What the fuck is going on with the bolded, by the way? Does Abbott really want to dump coal mining waste in the Great Barrier Reef? Please explain it to me, Australia-SDN.
Xisiqomelir wrote:What the fuck is going on with the bolded, by the way? Does Abbott really want to dump coal mining waste in the Great Barrier Reef? Please explain it to me, Australia-SDN.
That's not really an accurate description. The stuff they want to dump there isn't mine leavings, it's sea bed, dug up to make a harbour deeper.
Still seems pretty stupid - it can't be hard to find somewhere better to empty your wheelbarrow than in a protected park.
Xisiqomelir wrote:What the fuck is going on with the bolded, by the way? Does Abbott really want to dump coal mining waste in the Great Barrier Reef? Please explain it to me, Australia-SDN.
That's not really an accurate description. The stuff they want to dump there isn't mine leavings, it's sea bed, dug up to make a harbour deeper.
Still seems pretty stupid - it can't be hard to find somewhere better to empty your wheelbarrow than in a protected park.
Thanks, it seemed too much like a Captain Planet plot from the Guardian's description.
loomer wrote:..., Labour - our oldest political party.
Gotta correct you there, Loomer. It's 'Labor'; remember, Australian politics - One side can't spell, the other doesn't own a dictionary.
About the reef, though; as far as I'm aware, that's just a state thing, not federal, and so not Abbott. Not that I've heard that Abbott's been busting a gut to stop it.
And finally, on the main topic:
Unesco has unanimously rejected a “feeble” Australian government bid to reopen 74,000 hectares of Tasmania’s world heritage area to logging.
Awwww.... what a shame.
“I am the King of Rome, and above grammar”
Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor
