In 1997 Forest Enterprises clearfelled the native forest next door. The residents of West Calder were given no warning. An aerial spraying operation was planned as a follow-up to destroy the groundcover in preparation for the planting of an exotic monoculture of Niten eucalypt trees.
Our entire community (with the exception of the household that leased their property to Forest Enterprises) were appalled at what had already taken place.
The community subsequently organised for a letter to be sent to Forest Enterprises seeking a written undertaking that the company would not spray any toxic agricultural chemicals on the coupe concerned. The reasons given were (i) the threat to the health and safety and quality of life of members of the community and (ii) the ongoing nature of this threat which would require long- term monitoring of individual water supplies - a cost the community refused to bear.
The coupe concerned was the water catchment for both the nearby Inglis and Calder Rivers. It had a multitude of creeks, streams, dams, and swamps on it. There was no practical way that aerial spraying could take place over that land without contaminating water. In addition, the area is home to the giant freshwater crayfish and other threatened or vulnerable species.
A drawn-out political battle ensured. The then Liberal Government allowed the application of residual and water-finding pesticides over the entire coupe. They were applied in water-logged and damaged streamside reserves.
Although aerial application of herbicides didn't take place as feared it alarmed us when we were notified that drinking water tanks (3 out of only 5 tested) were already contaminated by a highly toxic herbicide.
The local newspaper reported on our contamination experience. But the story downplayed the dangers that were presented to our community by the presence of Simazine in our drinking water. The article failed to mention that the contamination was picked up by accident. It failed to say that the levels were over three times that accepted by the World Health Organisation. No reference was made to the fact that no-one knew what the ORIGINAL levels of contamination were. Nor did the paper highlight the refusal of the Department of Environment to extend the monitoring of drinking water to the rest of the region nor test for the entire range of pesticides that could also be present in our rainwater tanks.
So, why did the Department of Environment refuse to assess the risk exposure in our region? After all, the Simazine in the tanks at West Calder had clearly drifted by at least 4-5 kilometres. No aerial spraying occurred closer than that. How bad was the situation closer to the action?
Why did this same Department and the subsequent newly formed Department of Primary Industries, Water and Environment continue to refuse to provide an ongoing monitoring system for local residents? Why did DPIWE allow (and continue to allow) a whole range of pesticides to be applied in a manner that was GUARANTEED to drift onto neighbouring and community property?
Industrial 'forestry' (read clearfell/plantation industry) began to quickly dominate the West Calder/Takone region. We began to notice planes and helicopters a hundred plus feet in the air spraying several kilometres away several times a year. Indeed Forestry Tasmania began to spray high over a plantation coupe along the Takone Road that was the upper catchment for a creek providing the water supply for several households along the West Calder Road. Their 'monitoring system' involved checking the immediate neighbour's tank when the pipe from the roof was disconnected before, during and after spraying.
When I complained about our vulnerability a DPIWE worker came out and checked my family's tank - again, with the pipe disconnected before, during and after the spraying event.
The integrity of the so-called regulatory agencies was now well and truly LOST. Risk assessment data was asked for over and over again and not provided. Startling things were said on the phone by bureaucrats that these same people were uncomfortable repeating publicly.
When Gunns Ltd moved in for yet another aerial spraying operation along the Takone Road the community pleaded for funds from the corporation to carry out their own INDEPENDENT testing. No response was provided and Gunns Ltd sprayed.
A local newspaper quoted Gunns Ltd claiming that no contaminants were ever found with their testing regime.
DPIWE continue to deny reliable and standardised protocols for sampling and
testing pesticides in water 50+ YEARS AFTER PESTICIDES ARE APPROVED FOR USE IN
TASMANIA!!
(See: DPIWE
While we continue to read about 'ecologically sustainable forest management' (ESFM) as underpinning the Tasmanian forest industry the people in Tasmania feel sick in the gut.
Tasmania has the highest cancer rate in Australia and Australia has almost the highest cancer incidence in the world.
The National Forest Policy Statement of 1992 is supposed to underpin and
justify the management of our forest industry. It forms the basis for
legitimising the Regional Forest Agreement and the Australian Forestry
Standard. The NFP Statement provides the following definition of 'sustainable
forest management':
"The integration of commercial and non-commercial values of forests so that
both the material and non-material welfare of society is improved, whilst
ensuring that the values of forests, both as a resource for commercial use and
for conservation, are not lost or degraded for current and future generations."
Woolly and wordy but enough is said to prove that the legal basis for industrial plantation management is non-existent. So why does the industry and the so-called regulatory agencies continue to get away with this?
Brenda Rosser is another in a growing list of ordinary Tasmanians whose voice has echoed painfully off the massive stone wall of big business and bureaucracy.
Quoted in The Times Are Out of Joint:
Brenda Rosser said of herself,
"My family's individual struggle and victimisation is typical of what is
happening across the populated and high-rainfall areas of rural Australia.
In 1984 we moved to North West Tasmania and chose a relatively isolated
area to live - one that was away from farms that used chemicals and where
the stands of native bush were extensive and beautiful.
"All that changed in the mid 1990s when the State and Federal Governments pushed the Regional Forest 'Agreement' and the Plantations 2020 Vision onto ordinary citizens. The native forest was largely destroyed as a result and it was replaced by a huge monoculture tree plantation using an exotic species of Eucalypts called 'Nitens'.
...
"In 1997 we woke stunned to hear a bulldozer clearing the native trees only 60 feet away from our house. The loss of the trees we had loved threw us into shock and grief. But there was more to come...
She adds this link:
An archive of contamination:
ALSO:
Australia's Inhumane Plantation 2020 Vision
The Sunday Tasmanian today ran three articles detailing the impact of forestry operations on ordinary country people...
Excerpts and links:
A clean and green dream destroyed
By SIMON BEVILACQUA
11jan04
"IT'S a magical fairyland at night," says Zainab Clark about her new home.
She is in love with her country cottage up a gravel road in a secluded valley near Cygnet.
Mrs Clark moved from New South Wales to her new Tasmanian home
with husband Geoff and their two young children, Latifa, 11, and Nadira, 7, in June.
But after only six months she wants out.
Tomorrow Gunns Ltd contractors plan to start clearfelling
the bush that creates an idyllic backdrop to the Clarks' rural scene.
"They're going to destroy what we came here for," Mrs Clark said.
The Clarks are among many interstate families wooed to Tasmania by its unique environment.
They wanted to be part of an "environmentally aware" community and heard Cygnet, an hour south of Hobart, was the place.
"We heard so much about Tasmania," Mrs Clark said.
"It was clean and green, peaceful, a perfect place to raise a family."
The link:
http://www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,8366490%255E3462,00.html
Logging to start right next door
11jan04
THE Clark family can do little to stop logging beginning
tomorrow on a neighbouring property near Cygnet,
the Environmental Defenders Office says.
The EDO, a non-profit legal service advising
on environmental and planning law, said it had been
involved with dozens of people with concerns about logging next to their property.
EDO lawyer Nick Mackey said residents had no legal rights
when it came to their concerns about their paradise and views being destroyed or their properties devalued.
Forestry operations were exempt from laws that gave residents the
chance to appeal against the devaluation of their property or aesthetics.
Mr Mackey said once a neighbouring property had been declared
a private timber reserve, there was no legal avenue to stop the logging.
The link:
http://www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,8366483%255E3462,00.html
Forced to fight the damage
By SIMON BEVILACQUA
11jan04
IN rural settings across the state, Tasmanians are being forced to fight the clearfelling of properties next door.
Gardener Gay Klok has fought the logging of a property next to her home at Middleton, south of Hobart.
Mrs Klok says logging and use of herbicides and pesticides have harmed her garden,
which has featured in national and international publications.
Middleton organic farmer Stuart Young fought to protect
his chicken farm from the effects of logging next door to his property.
Mr Young fought the issue, not as a forestry issue, but on the grounds
that 1080 poison was likely to affect his organic certification.
He ended up in a Supreme Court battle with Gunns and managed to get the
country's largest woodchipper to pay for a fence between the neighbouring properties.
The link:
http://www.themercury.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5936,8366486%255E3462,00.html
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First published Sunday, January 11, 2004; republished Wednesday, September 29, 2004