Let's keep our sunburnt country alive

FORESTS STAND FOR LIFE

Let's keep our sunburnt country alive

Protecting Australia’s forests is one of the most important things we can do to manage climate change, preserve our unique biodiversity and prevent further species extinctions in Australia.

Wilderness Australia is committed to achieving protection for our native forests through bringing an end to native forest logging in Australia.

Watch this space. We are currently developing a national forests campaign.

Your support is vital

People who share our love of nature want it to be safe, healthy and resilient, now and in the future.

With your support, together we can tackle emerging threats to our native forests, speak up for the restoration of wilderness in damaged but significant areas and nurture natural life across this sunburnt country.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Get the facts fast

Is there a logging industry in Australia?

Australia has some of the tallest forests in the world. The tallest trees, the Mountain Ash, were found in Australia until they were logged almost a century ago.

Since the 1960’s, Australia has been intensively logging these tall forests for wood chips that are turned into paper products. A much smaller volume of forests has been logged for timber.

Today, existing plantations in Australia and around the world could provide for our nation’s timber and paper needs; there is no significant reason to be logging Australia’s forests.

How does protecting forests counter climate change

Did you know that there is more carbon stored in the Earth’s terrestrial ecosystems (plants and soil) than in the oceans and atmosphere combined? Forests suck carbon out of the atmosphere like a giant vacuum cleaner during the process of photosynthesis, when converting carbon dioxide into biomass (such as branches, trunks, roots and soil carbon) and the oxygen that we breathe.

Australia’s forests store a huge amount of carbon that would otherwise be in the atmosphere as a greenhouse gas. The forests of south eastern Australia, for example, have been found to contain 640 tonnes of carbon per hectare - and some Mountain Ash forests can contain 2,000 tonnes per hectare.

Logging releases much of this carbon back into the atmosphere. A dangerous new logging industry is under development in Australia, which aims to cut down and burn our forests to produce electricity - called ‘biomass burning.’ This would be a disaster for our climate as well as for biodiversity.

How does preventing logging counter biodiversity loss?

Australia’s forests are some of the most biodiverse in the world and are home to more than 18,000 plant species and more than 2,000 animals species.

Logging destroys the habitat of our forest fauna, including removing food sources and nesting sites like the naturally-formed hollows that are abundant in old trees. The science shows that logging reduces biodiversity and threatens some species with extinction.

If we want to prevent the Sixth Mass Extinction from occurring in Australia, forest protection must be a priority.

FORESTS STAND FOR LIFE