Forest Products Industry

Forestry Australia has made clear that its proposed Enhancing Native Forest Resilience carbon method is designed not to enable additional native forest harvesting, but to support scientifically demonstrated improvements in forest carbon, health and resilience. Forestry Australia President Dr Michelle Freeman said this misrepresents both the organisation and the proposal. Source: Timberbiz “Forestry Australia is the professional association for forest scientists, managers and other forestry professionals working across Australia’s forests and landscapes,” Dr Freeman said. “Our members work across conservation, native and plantation forest management, recreation, research, fire management, Indigenous engagement, farm forestry, environmental services and restoration. “Our proposed method reflects that breadth. It is not about logging more forests. It is about using carbon investment to support genuine, additional and scientifically demonstrated improvements in forest carbon and forest health and resilience.” The proposed method is intended to apply across different forest tenures and management objectives, including potentially national parks and conservation reserves, Traditional Owner-managed forests, private forests and state forests. It recognises that Australia’s forests are diverse, face different pressures and cannot be managed through a single prescription. Climate change, severe wildfire, drought, pests, invasive species and disease are increasing pressures on forests. In some landscapes, active intervention may be needed to restore forest condition, support regeneration and improve resilience. “Forest management is not a binary choice between harvesting a forest and leaving it alone,” Dr Freeman said. “Active and adaptive management in forests includes assisted regeneration, ecological restoration, cultural and prescribed burning, ecological thinning, pest and weed control, protecting habitat trees, post-fire recovery, or changing or deferring harvesting.” “The intervention should follow the science and the needs of the forest, not a predetermined land-use outcome.” The proposed carbon method takes a multifunctional, landscape-scale approach, recognising that forests provide multiple values including biodiversity, carbon storage, water, cultural values, recreation and renewable forest products. Forestry Australia has identified practical examples where carbon investment could support better forest outcomes, including assisted regeneration of Alpine ash forests affected by repeated severe fires and management of heavily stocked cypress pine forests where growth has stagnated. At the centre of the proposal is a simple principle: carbon credits should reward demonstrated carbon outcomes, not particular land uses. “The critical question is whether an intervention delivers a genuine, additional and conservatively measured carbon benefit, supported by sound science and environmental safeguards,” Dr Freeman said. A high-integrity method should therefore include credible baselines, robust carbon accounting, transparent modelling, appropriate treatment of leakage and permanence, environmental safeguards and ongoing monitoring. Forestry Australia submitted the proposal through the Australian Government process for developing new methods under the Australian Carbon Credit Unit Scheme. The Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee assessed it as having “excellent alignment” with the Offsets Integrity Standards and suitable for further method development when resources permit. “Carbon markets can provide important investment in healthier, more resilient forests, but only where the carbon benefits being credited are real,” Dr Freeman said. “The same integrity test should apply to every project: does it deliver genuine, additional and defensible climate benefit?” Dr Freeman said Australia also needed a broader conversation about the future of its native forests. “Reducing this discussion to whether someone is ‘for’ or ‘against’ native forest harvesting does not help us address the complex challenges our forests face. “We should instead ask how the best available science can help maintain healthy, resilient forests that store carbon, conserve biodiversity and provide the environmental, cultural, social and economic values Australians expect from them. “That is the purpose of Forestry Australia’s proposal. The management should follow the science. The carbon accounting should follow the evidence.”

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Forest & Wood Communities Australia says the Senate vote allowing the Improved Native Forest Management (INFM) carbon method to survive does not resolve the serious scientific, economic and carbon-accounting concerns surrounding the scheme. Source: Timberbiz The Senate rejected the disallowance motion 34 votes to 27 after the majority of Federal Greens reached an agreement with the Albanese Government. Three Greens senators – Nick McKim, Vanessa Bleyer and Jordon Steele-John broke ranks and voted to disallow the method. AFPA is concerned and disappointed Australian Forest Products Association (AFPA) has also expressed disappointment and concern after the Senate voted to support the Federal Government’s approval of the controversial Improved Native Forest Management (INFM) method. AFPA says it has been working closely with the Coalition, including Senator Ross Cadell and the crossbench on the disallowance motion seeking to stop the flawed new carbon method. The decision means the INFM method can be used on other projects and will also allow the NSW Government to formalise the establishment of the Great Koala National Park.  The deal also creates further questions about the future value, transparency and integrity of ACCUs by excluding coal and gas offsets. Following the vote, AFPA met with Assistant Minister Wilson to raise more concerns about the method’s lack of transparency, potential impacts on ACCU values, and implications for managed forests and the private native forestry sector. We also highlighted ongoing concerns about unresolved technical issues with FullCAM. Forestry Australia analysis shows flaws in INFM Forestry Australia’s recent analysis showed the INFM method could overstate carbon benefits by 40 to 100%, raising serious questions about the integrity of the scheme. Over-crediting means issuing more carbon credits than the actual carbon saved or removed from the atmosphere — a problem that could undermine confidence in Australia’s entire carbon market. FWCA Chair Steve Dobbyns said the parliamentary vote settled a political question, but it did not settle whether ACCUs generated under the method represent genuine, additional and conservatively calculated carbon abatement. “You cannot fix a carbon-accounting problem with a political deal,” Mr Dobbyns said. “Whether the Greens support the INFM, the Coalition opposes it or Labor promotes it is ultimately irrelevant to the integrity test. “An Australian Carbon Credit Unit is supposed to represent one tonne of genuine carbon dioxide equivalent abatement. That requires evidence, not political agreement.” Formal request lodged with Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee FWCA has already lodged a formal request with the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee under section 255AA of the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Act seeking a statutory review of the INFM method. That request asks ERAC to examine unresolved issues including: the method’s arbitrary 40% ceiling on indirect carbon leakage; evidence that reductions in Australian native forest timber production are substantially displaced to imported timber; whether projects based on pre-existing government commitments satisfy the statutory additionality test; Forestry Australia’s concerns about FullCAM modelling and potentially substantial over-crediting; the relationship between the 15-year regional harvesting constraints and 100-year carbon protection obligations; and significant changes made to the method following public consultation. Mr Dobbyns said none of those fundamental issues had been resolved by this week’s agreement between Labor and the Greens. “The Greens say they have secured an increase in the required reduction in harvesting to 25 per cent in 2028 and 30% for projects registered after 2030, changes to plantation definitions and restrictions on who can purchase credits from projects such as the Great Koala National Park. “But the Federal Government’s own announcement says the Assistant Minister has asked ERAC for advice on variations to the method, including the proposed 30% threshold and plantation definitions. “So, before anyone declares the method ‘fixed’, we need to distinguish between a political undertaking and an amended methodology determination.” Mr Dobbyns said increasing the amount of timber production that must be removed from a region did not resolve the leakage problem and could potentially increase it. “If Australia removes more domestic hardwood production while Australian demand for timber remains, the obvious question is where the replacement timber comes from,” he said. “Recent Australian research found that approximately 81% of reductions in native forest hardwood production were displaced to imports. That does not automatically mean 81% carbon leakage, but it makes rigorous leakage assessment essential. “Yet the INFM method prevents the indirect leakage deduction from exceeding 40%, even if an independent assessment were to conclude that the actual carbon leakage was higher. “That is precisely the sort of issue ERAC should independently examine.” FWCA also noted that Forestry Australia has warned that structural features of the INFM method could overstate claimed abatement by between 40 and 100% before the full effects of leakage and carbon stored in harvested wood products are considered. “These are not arguments about whether people like national parks or whether koalas should be protected,” Mr Dobbyns said. “FWCA supports effective conservation based on sound science. The issue is whether taxpayers and Australian businesses should be required to pay for carbon credits unless the claimed carbon benefit can withstand rigorous independent scrutiny. “The Great Koala National Park was a government election commitment made before the INFM existed. It was announced as government policy and public funding had already been identified. “If the park was going to be created anyway, the fundamental additionality question remains: what extra carbon abatement is the taxpayer or ACCU purchaser actually buying?” Mr Dobbyns said the extraordinary division within the environmental movement reinforced the case for an independent examination rather than treating the Senate vote as the end of the debate. Three Federal Greens senators have publicly questioned whether the Great Koala National Park credits would be additional, while the Greens in Western Australia and Tasmania and prominent environmental campaigners have also opposed the INFM. “FWCA does not necessarily agree with their broader views on forestry or carbon markets, but on one point there should be common ground: carbon credits must represent real additional abatement,” Mr Dobbyns said. “The Senate has voted. The integrity questions remain.” “ERAC should now undertake the statutory review requested by […]

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