Go-ahead for North-East timber mill

A NEW timber mill slated for northern Tasmania has passed another approval stage but the Wilderness Society says it should not be the future of the state’s forestry industry.

George Town councillors this week unanimously approved a development application for the $54 million veneer, plywood and woodchip processing plant at Bell Bay, expected to employ up to 109 full-time workers.

It is understood Allen Wong, director of the mill’s proponents, WA-based company Patriarch and Sons, has been in China marketing Tasmanian timber this week.

However, Wilderness Society campaign manager Tom Allen said the State Government should have been less welcoming of Patriarch and Sons, which has links to the Shin Yang Group, a Malaysian logging giant and producer of palm oil.

“If we’re serious about sustainable forestry in Tasmania, do we really want to invite in another logging company from the dark side?” Mr Allen said.

The Wilderness Society has called on Patriarch and Sons to guarantee it won’t take wood from Future Potential Production Forest Land, which the government can open for logging of native timber from April next year.

Patriarch and Sons has so far indicated its intention to buy wood from “existing public and private sources”, including plantations and native forests currently being woodchipped.

The Environment Protection Authority has judged the mill to be “environmentally sustainable and acceptable” as long as certain conditions, including a production limit of 80,000 tonnes of woodchips per year, were followed.

Resources Minister Sarah Courtney said she had been advised there would be “no new logging of public forest resour- ces as a result of this proposal”.

“It is not expected that this proposal will increase the area or intensity of harvesting in Tasmania’s Permanent Timber Production Zone Land,” Ms Courtney said this week.

“The government welcomes proposals that value-add in the forest industry chain within Tasmania, leading to more jobs and investment.

“It is hardly surprising that the Wilderness Society continues to make unsubstantiated allegations against Tasmania’s sustainable forestry industry.”

George Town mayor Brudget Archer said the mill was an exciting development for the area. “Council has a strong and a proud industrial history and hopefully industrial future and we are supportive of this type of development.”

Patriarch and Sons expects the first of the mill’s three construction stages to be finished by mid-year, while the second stage is due to be ready by the end of the year.