West Coast native loggers call for salvage law extension
THE CONTINUATION OF NATIVE LOGGING on the West Coast depends on an extension of the current salvage laws And “an outbreak of practical common sense”, according to Kumara-based saw miller, Mike McGrath.
This sentiment was echoed throughout the coastal logging fraternity after the clean-up following Cyclone Fehi in early February, and then the remnants of Cyclone Gita a couple of weeks later, which dumped more trees on the ground.
Locals say that these latest cyclones illustrate that the West Coast Windblown Timber (Conservation Lands) Act, introduced to allow selective logging of trees flattened by Cyclone Ita in April 2014, should be extended.
The Act, introduced by the National Government to allow for valuable timber to be salvaged, rather than rot on the ground, applied only to damage by Ita over a five-year period, which comes to an end next year.
"Why can't this be continued to cover other major weather events?" Mr McGrath asks.
He urged the new Forestry Minister, Shane Jones, to take a serious look at the situation when he visited the Coast in March.
Mr McGrath and his fellow loggers want to know "where do we go from here" when the current salvaging Act ends.
He says his team only had about 500m3 of wood left to recover, mostly from privatelyowned forests.
And most other salvaging operations throughout conservation land has already been completed, due to general deterioration of the wood on the ground. But in the short timespan allowed for salvaging, Hokitika-based Department of Conservation officials report that more than $1.1m in royalties had gone into DoC coffers.
The department's head of the salvaging programme, Tim Shaw, reports this had significantly boosted DoC's biodiversity work
and pest control efforts.
Limited logging still takes place in some privately-owned forests under the Forestry Act’s environmentally sustainable production criteria, but it is on a very small scale and coasters argue that it could provide more employment and business opportunities if on-going salvage of wind-blown timber was allowed to continue on DoC land.
Without that additional supply, opportunities to cut native timber are limited. Up in the Buller region some 7,000ha of mostly Beech forest outside DoC-administered conservation land has provided a source of Red Beech logs for the NZ Sustainable Forest Products (NZSFP) sawmill near Reefton. These forests are carefully managed under a select logging regime, where only a few trees are helicopter-extracted per hectare, leaving a natural canopy break to allow prolific seedling growth to get underway.
Down south at Hari Hari, Dave Hindman operates a sawmill and has been able to extract logs sourced from privately-owned forests using similar techniques to enhance regeneration of Podocarp timber, mostly Rimu.
Using both a fixed mill and a Mahoe portable sawmill, his team is capable of cutting up to 25m3 per day, particularly when boosted by salvaged logs from DoC lands. He says that currently his sheds contain approximately 5m3 of top grade cut Rimu ready for sale.
His company, Hindman Smartsaw Ltd, air dries the timber before it is transported to joinery firms, wood processors and timber merchants.
Mike McGrath dispatches his cut boards to Christchurch for kiln drying before it is sold to buyers in Christchurch, Auckland, Wellington and Whanganui. He operates two portable mills, using one to cut logs in the bush to be heli-lifted out. Chief cutter and machine operator is 22-year-old Gemma Gold.
Mr McGrath has only a limited source of privately-owned forestsupplied wood. Since running out of salvaged logs he had only milled 4 cubic metres on the day of my visit and was loading a week’s cut onto a Canterbury Western Transport truck and trailer unit bound for Christchurch.
Meanwhile, at Reefton NZ Sustainable Forest Products’ upgraded mill continues to produce speciality products such as veneers and T&G flooring from its Red Beech resource on non-conservation land. The select felling system used by NZSFP has been going for more than 12 years, with a percentage of the royalties earmarked for environmental management, particularly for pest control.
When the Act was passed it provided a further boost of funding for DoC, which is well ahead of allocations for its own estate. Salvaging wind-throw on DoC lands provides royalties of $250 p/m3 for Podocarp and $60 for Beech.
These activities are feeding a profitable niche market industry, which has been considerably boosted by the salvaging Act since 2014. As well as saving taxpayer money by funding DoC activities it has also reduced the need for imports of unsustainably logged hardwoods from some Asian nations.
It is estimated that New Zealand imported around $76 million of hardwoods between 2012 and 2013, with some reckoned to have
been illegally logged. This trade depressed the price of timber sourced from sustainably logged forests by 7-to-16%.
Also imported was just under $317m worth of wood products from China, which has faced criticism for being complicit in the smuggling of illegal timber mixed in with legally logged wood, according to an NZ Wood report.
In New Zealand, the Forestry Act was amended in 1993 to ensure that wood grown here is managed sustainably to provide benefits for biodiversity and society.
Currently there are 50,000 hectares of indigenous forest in NZ that has an allowable harvest of 78,000m3. According to Ministry of Primary Industries figures, imports last year totalled 76,000 tonnes, whilst locally milled hardwoods reached 9,000 tonnes.
In my last report, published in NZ Logger in February 2016, I mentioned that the sustainability issue was likely to get political by 2019, when the Salvage Act period finishes. It’s already showing signs of going that way and the new Government will be coming under some pressure.
Looming large on Coastal loggers’ minds is that Conservation Minister, Eugenie Sage, has indicated she would not have a bar on moving any wind-blown logs out of the conservation forests.
The contention seems to be that, according to the Green lobby, the mulch forming in fallen bush is necessary for forest regeneration. But most of the logs that are blown down are already left for this natural purpose to occur, foresters argue.
In the small, hand-picked areas slated for salvaging, only selected logs marked by DoC and with MPI approval were extracted by helicopter. There was no tracking, and roughly 90% of the residue was left to continue rotting. Coaster foresters are well aware of the regeneration capability or our native bush. All forests regenerate from their own seedlings and lateral roots, Red Beech being one of the most prolific.
West Coast loggers are hoping that the more pragmatic Minister of Forests, Shane Jones, will have seen the value of continuing some form of limited salvage work in the future.
A glossy publication published by the West Coast Governance Plan – Tai Poutini West Coast Economic Development Action Plan 2017 – notes that "around 30-to-50 people have had work directly generated by the opportunity at various stages across the sawmilling, forestry and transport sectors."
It goes on to say that the quantity and quality of available timber has declined, as has the amount of timber being extracted and
the number of active operators. It is unlikely that significant operations will extend beyond 2017.
The report adds: "The experience has shown that windblown timber can be safely recovered without significant harm to the conservation value of harvest areas. It has also provided significant revenue for DoC to protect conservation land from plant and animal pests.
"The action will assess the lessons, costs and benefits from the WCWT Act and identify, if appropriate, legislative change options that would enable ongoing access to timber on Public Conservation Land that is felled as a result of natural events.”
However, after a visit by an MPI group in January/February, DoC's Tim Shaw is not optimistic anything significant will happen.
A joint DoC / MPI statement at the time of the Parliamentary Act stated: "The purpose...is to outline the Principles and Guidelines that have informed the management approach that will be applied by (DoC) to achieve the environmental protection required by the Act.
"The management approach will need to be able to adapt and change as more is learned through the implementation of the Act. Accordingly, this document should be considered as a working draft."
The wording in the statement indicated a certain amount of flexibility when the Act was passed and provided the basis for the future hopes of the Coast foresters. Whether the current political landscape allows this to happen, remains to be seen.
NZL