A local timber mill assures it is sustainable after news rocked the forestry industry that more than 260 jobs were at risk at a mill in Gippsland.
The Heyfield mill’s owner, Australian Sustainable Hardwood (ASH), announced last Friday it would close its doors in 2018, despite pledges from Premier Daniel Andrews that taxpayers would step in and buy the site.
“We only harvest for sawmilling, trees of a certain size class, and to improve the stand we thin regrowth trees to allow improved growth rates creating a more healthy cohort of trees remaining,” Koondrook-based Arbuthnot Sawmills managing director, Paul Madden, said.
The 128-year-old mill supplies red gum timber, which it says is a “sustainably managed, renewable resource”.
“Proof of sustainability is the fact that we are harvesting regrowth trees within five kilometres from the mill,” Mr Madden told The Guardian.
ASH chief executive Vince Hurley said the company needed 130,000 cubic metres of sawlogs each year but was offered just 200,000 over three years along with a $4.7 million operational subsidy.
Government-owned VicForests harvests the timber for ASH and says the supply offer was “at a level we believe can be sustainably produced”, while also considering existing contracts with other customers.
To read more of this story, grab a copy of Friday’s Guardian (March 24).
