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The Allan Government’s Great Outdoors Taskforce will not be recommending the creation of any new national parks across 1.8 million hectares of Victoria’s state forests. Source: The Weekly Times Taskforce chair and former Labor Minister Lisa Neville said the feedback from 185 stakeholder groups and 4149 submissions “made it clear that more impact could be achieved by making recommendations to improve state forest management systems, instead of focusing on changes to land tenure”. “Therefore, the taskforce will not be making any recommendation for large-scale changes to land tenure, including not creating any new national parks,” she said. “Our report will be submitted to the Minister for Environment in mid-2025. The taskforce expects the Minister will then consider a response.” But the taskforce was precluded from investigating 390,000ha of state forest across the Central Highlands, leaving the door open for the government to create a new Great Forest National Park across the region. The future management of the Central Highlands, Strathbogie Ranges and Mirboo North state forests was instead referred to Labor’s Eminent Panel for Community Engagement, which lodged its findings with the government in October last year. Environment Minister Steve Dimopoulos is yet to release the panel’s report. In the meantime, Premier Jacinta Allan has promised to introduce legislation later this year to convert 50,000ha of state forest into three new national parks in Victoria’s Central West – Wombat-Lerderderg, Mount Buangor and Pyrenees National Parks. Ms Neville said one of the key messages that came out of the taskforce’s engagement with the community was “the strong connection so many of us have to Victoria’s forests and the underpinning desire to make sure our forests are looked after and enjoyed by all. “There is strong support, and a shared understanding across stakeholders, that we need to manage forests in a way that balances conservation, recreation, and economic opportunities within Victoria.” She said that broadly, the taskforce heard people wanted enduring reform for the management of Victoria’s state forests, including: New leadership and governance models enabling and accelerating local partnerships and multi-stakeholder decision-making. A long-term vision and strategy to manage state forests for multiple values and shared outcomes. Addressing infrastructure and investment gaps for recreation and tourism to build economic resilience Healing country and managing forests in ways that combine conservation science, forest science, local and Indigenous knowledge Education and behaviour change for forest users Closing legislative ‘loopholes’ that could enable the return of native timber harvesting in Victoria Adequate and long-term funding for all of the above. Further information about the progress of the taskforce’s work can be found at https://www.deeca.vic.gov.au/futureforests/future-forests/great-outdoors-taskforce