I wish I was full of hope and believed that protecting forests and biodiversity is a responsibility that the NSW government will honour without the INFM incentives, but I don’t.
There’s outrage on the carbon trading principle which I understand, but there’s points being overlooked. The proposed carbon credits are only for a quarter of the carbon saved during the 15 year crediting period and not available for coal and gas companies. There’s also safeguards to avoid the rorting of the system as Victoria has done.
The benefits of protecting public forests for 100 years is significant for values other than carbon crediting.
The Great Koala NP is 176,000 ha, the proposed Great Southern Forest NP is 1.2m ha and the proposal for the Richmond River Koala Parks is over 52,000 ha. The biodiversity within those areas includes the habitat of hundreds of threatened species. There’s also benefits for water quantity and quality as well as reducing the risk of fire by enhancing the creation of moist forests. There’s also commitments to Aboriginal management. These are priorities I care about and if the INFM incentives aren’t available for the NSW Government to commit to end logging in public forests, then I despair.
This is why I’m supporting the INFM for NSW and encourage others to contact Green senators.
Jan Barham, Broken Head
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