Forest Protection Threatens Mill Town In NE Victoria
8/29/99
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Title: Forest Protection Threatens Mill Town In NE Victoria
Source: The Age
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: August 29, 1999
Byline: BEN MITCHELL
The Kennett Government was not interested in the plight of country
people despite the warm noises it made about promoting regional
Victoria, the mayor of the Alpine Shire Council said last week.
Councillor Charles Duncan said the recent State and Federal
Government agreement restricting logging in the forests around the
north-east Victorian town of Mount Beauty showed the State Government
was only concerned about city people.
The agreement, including a decision to lock away 2700 hectares of
mature alpine ash forest in the Wongungarra Valley near Mount Hotham,
threatens the viability of the Mount Beauty timber mill which employs
55 people or about 20 per cent of the town's workforce.
Cr Duncan said as many as 135 jobs over and above those at the mill
could also be lost.
``The economy in Mount Beauty is very fragile. We are still
recovering from the rationalisation of the State Electricity
Commission where 275 jobs were reduced to less than 40. To lose the
mill would be a disaster,'' Cr Duncan said.
He said the State Government should contribute to the bridging fund
to keep the mill operational.
``The State Government makes lovely warm noises about what it's doing
for rural Victoria, but sadly rural Victoria does not feel that. The
mill issue has personified that for me,'' he said.
``The Victorian Government needs to understand that there is a
Victoria beyond the tram tracks in Melbourne.''
The Federal Government has committed up to $850,000 to the mill,
contingent on an agreed business plan, but the state is yet to offer
any funds.
The manager of Mount Beauty timbers, Mr Bruce Addinsall, said the
business would need $3.3 million to continue operating until regrowth
forests in the region were ready for logging. Money was also needed
to remodel the mill to deal with the immature regrowth logs.
``If we are not able to access funding to keep us going until we can
access the regrowth timber in our region, then we could potentially
be forced to shut,'' Mr Addinsall said.
``We were relying on the resource that has been locked away by this
agreement to get us through until the regrowth was ready. Even with
support we will be forced to restructure our operation.''
The secretary of the Mount Beauty Chamber of Commerce, Mr Tony
Roberts, said the flow-on effects from the mill's closure would
devastate the town. ``The mill generates something like $60,000 in
wages a week that would disappear. At least half of that money is
spent in the town,'' he said.
``We are trying to get investment in the town; trying to convince
the Alpine Shire to hire a consultant to develop a business plan, but
all of that is on hold because of the threat to the mill.''
The town expressed unanimous support for the mill at a meeting last
week and the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union has
vowed to fight.
The Wilderness Society has praised the Regional Forest Agreement,
describing it as a defining moment for the retiring Environment
Minister, Mrs Marie Tehan.
The secretary of the Beechworth Environment Group, Dr Stephen
Gulliford, said that if subsidisation was required to keep loggers
out of the old-growth forests, it should be forthcoming.
``But obviously there should be long-term vision where logging in
existing forests is phased out in favor of plantation timber,'' Dr
Gulliford said.