On Thursday 20 September Senator Abetz, the Minister for Conservation defended the Tax Laws Amendment (2007 Measures No. 6) Bill 2007 that will give tax credits for land-clearing on the Tiwi Islands. In doing so he has exposed the hyprocracy behind the Howard Government’s Global Initiative on Forests and Climate which had the stated aim of limiting the destruction of forests and preventing illegal logging, both of which are occurring on the Tiwi Islands.
If you don’t agree with the Senator then please let him know via email, especially if you live in Tasmania.
If you live in Australia than why not send the same message to our forest clearing Prime Minister.
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A quick look through google earth (as stated by Senator Milne) clearly shows the sort of activity that has caused breaches in the environmental conditions for Great Southern’s plantations on the Tiwi Islands. Condition 3 of the approval states;
The proponents will not undertake future clearing on treeless plains, riparian areas, water courses, or rainforests, and the following buffers are incorporated into site selection
wet rainforest patches: 400m
The video shows how close the landclearing and plantations are to the high conservation value rainforests, in this case their is a 100 metre buffer rather than the 400 metres as stipulated.
Unfortunately, the google earth image is old and does not show the real extent of land-clearing on the Tiwi Islands. Similarly, the date of the land-clearing is uncertain due to the lack of transparency surrounding the project. Land-clearing and breaches that have occurred since 2005 are not shown although we are aware of their existence (and they look very similar to the example in the video), as is the Commonwealth Investigation team which is investigating the breaches.
