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Australia: Certified monoculture tree plantations challenged for
aerial spraying and loss of biodiversity
Currently
the main plantation companies operating in Australia certified
by FSC are: Albany Plantation Forest Company Pty Ltd (23,509
ha), Timbercorp Forestry Pty Ltd. (97,000 ha), Integrated Tree
Cropping Limited (166,536 ha), Hancock Victorian Plantations Pty.
Limited (246,117 ha).
Among the
main impacts concerning certification of the newly planted blue
gum (Eucalyptus globulus) plantations in Australia is aerial
spraying regimes of pesticides on tree plantations and subsequent
pollution of drinking water. The problems related to aerial spraying
of Hancock plantations in water catchments that provide thousands
of Victorians with drinking water can be tracked at
http://www.forest-network.org/Docs/amis_fsc_05-04.htm
Brenda
Rosser, from the Tasmanian Clean Water Network, gave notice of
the health impacts of uncontrolled use of pesticides in Tasmania:
a surge in cancer and neurological cases, increase in the incident
rate for non-Hodgkins lymphoma, prostrate cancer, thyroid cancer,
and all cancers combined, as well as the highest percentage of
people suffering diabetes in Australia, and higher rates of coronary
heart disease, obesity, hypertension and high blood cholesterol
than other Australian States (see WRM Bulletin Nº 97). Brenda
Rosser’s conclusion about the FSC Review is that “If FSC continues
to keep ‘sustainability’ as a loose and woolly objective then
FSC will become (and I think it may be already) nothing more than
a corporate means to enhance the image of the 'forest' industry.”
