Should our current government succeed in overturning the registration of Tasmanian forests as part of the UN World Heritage listings it will be remembered as one of the greatest environmental vandals in history.
Greed must be fought with common sense. This is something the state premier of Tasmania and our current prime minister seem unable to understand. To log the forests will provide a brief window of employment followed by an endless winter of extensive and on-going job losses. Because clearly, Tasmania’s future is in the preservation of what the rest of the country has destroyed. These forests don’t belong to us. They belong to the planet and as such we have a global responsibility to preserve them for future generations. For in them will lie the jobs of the future.
Tourism is Tasmania’s strongest industry. It is clear that Australians and people from all over the world value the island for its natural heritage.
We know only a fraction of their worth in terms of medicines and health benefits.
But we certainly know their worth in terms of ecological diversity. And it’s that diversity which will be the key to our survival in a world rapidly spiralling into desert.
Do we really want the world to assume all Australians believe our environmental heritage doesn’t matter? Do we want the world to see us as so full of greed and ignorance that we will destroy what world keep us living?
We cannot get back what we throw away. Ancient trees cannot be regrown on a whim. It will be 500 years before we see such trees again. And if we destroy them now, will there be any Australia left to mourn them 500 years from now? And if there is, would anyone want to live there?
Wisdom teaches us : There will be no jobs on a dead planet.
Just last year 120,000 hectares of forest were added to a UN World Heritage Area.
But according to the federal government, 74,000 hectares of that don't need protection - a claim that has environmentalists up in arms.
"We have trees here that are 100m tall", Environment Tasmania CEO Charlie Sherwin says.
"They are the tallest hardwood trees on earth. Some of them fell from seed when Leonardo was painting the Mona Lisa."
The forest in question covers areas of the Upper Derwent, the Florentine and Huon Valleys, and the Hartz Mountains.
From an article by Gary Cox SBS World News
Greed must be fought with common sense. This is something the state premier of Tasmania and our current prime minister seem unable to understand. To log the forests will provide a brief window of employment followed by an endless winter of extensive and on-going job losses. Because clearly, Tasmania’s future is in the preservation of what the rest of the country has destroyed. These forests don’t belong to us. They belong to the planet and as such we have a global responsibility to preserve them for future generations. For in them will lie the jobs of the future.
Tourism is Tasmania’s strongest industry. It is clear that Australians and people from all over the world value the island for its natural heritage.
We know only a fraction of their worth in terms of medicines and health benefits.
But we certainly know their worth in terms of ecological diversity. And it’s that diversity which will be the key to our survival in a world rapidly spiralling into desert.
Do we really want the world to assume all Australians believe our environmental heritage doesn’t matter? Do we want the world to see us as so full of greed and ignorance that we will destroy what world keep us living?
We cannot get back what we throw away. Ancient trees cannot be regrown on a whim. It will be 500 years before we see such trees again. And if we destroy them now, will there be any Australia left to mourn them 500 years from now? And if there is, would anyone want to live there?
Wisdom teaches us : There will be no jobs on a dead planet.
Just last year 120,000 hectares of forest were added to a UN World Heritage Area.
But according to the federal government, 74,000 hectares of that don't need protection - a claim that has environmentalists up in arms.
"We have trees here that are 100m tall", Environment Tasmania CEO Charlie Sherwin says.
"They are the tallest hardwood trees on earth. Some of them fell from seed when Leonardo was painting the Mona Lisa."
The forest in question covers areas of the Upper Derwent, the Florentine and Huon Valleys, and the Hartz Mountains.
From an article by Gary Cox SBS World News
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