Greens Leader - Abbot Gov Made Deceptive Photo Selection In Bid To Delist UN World Heritage Forests
The government has been accused of misleading the UN in its bid to strip world heritage protection from tracts of Tasmanian forest, after the release of pictures purportedly showing that ecologically pristine areas will be delisted.
Bob Brown, the former Greens leader, has released a tranche of photos from the Weld Valley, one of several areas where the government wants to remove a total of 74,000 hectares of the world heritage protection. Brown said the images were evidence that 90% of the 74,000 hectares are “pristine, magnificent forests”. The government has argued a world heritage boundary extension last year include areas of logged, degraded forest that is being unnecessarily “locked up” from the timber industry.
The government has formally requested the world heritage committee reduce the protected Tasmanian forest area by 4.7%, claiming that the Tasmanian economy will benefit and that landholders were not properly consulted over the extension.
Brown told Guardian Australia: “The boundary has not been drawn by any environmental consistency, it’s for pure commercial expedience. I think their hidden agenda is to privatise the forests. “I’ve spent many days and nights in the forests on the hit list. They are a tourism drawcard and far more valuable as carbon storage than woodchips.”
EDIT
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/13/coalition-misled-un-heritage-listing-tasmanian-forest
