Tony Pasin
The forestry industry has made a desperate call for help to support local manufacturing after China banned all timber imports from South Australia and Tasmania. Source: Timberbiz, ABC.
China has continued its attack on Australian exports, with its ban on timber now including products from Tasmania and South Australia as well as Victoria and Queensland.
A notice from China’s custom officials claimed pests had bee
n detected in shipments of timber logs from the two Australian states.
“Recently, the customs of Shanghai, Ningbo, Xiamen, and Qingdao intercepted live forest pests from imported logs from Tasmania and South Australia,” the notice said.
“The relevant situation has been notified to the Australian authorities.”
As a result, the country has banned any shipments that were sent from these states from 3 December in a bid to “prevent the pests entering China and to protect our country’s forestry and ecological safety”.
Tasmania exported about $64.1 million worth of timber logs in 2019, including $44.2 million that went to China, while about $6.7m worth of timber logs was exported from SA in the same year and most of that went to China, according to Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade figures.
The industry fears up to 1000 forestry jobs in the Green Triangle, which incorporates Western Victoria and South East South Australia, could be lost by February/March next year if the trade ban is not resolved quickly.
SA’s industry was already severely impacted by the ban on Victoria as the overwhelming majority of the state’s timber exports is shipped from Portland
This is the latest in a series of trade attacks from China, with the federal government revealing it is “increasingly concerned” by the sanctions.
The Federal Member for Barker Tony Pasin, whose electorate is home to the nation’s largest softwood processing industry cluster, said the action by China was “simply disappointing”.
“I’m a little sceptical about the claims around biosecurity,” Mr Pasin said.
“I think we can see a very clear course of conduct that has nothing to do with any potential pests but rather has issues to do with the relationship between Australia and China.”
“I can assure you every effort is being put into alternative approaches, alternative markets and at the same time ameliorate with the Chinese, but quite simply, there are a number of issues I don’t think [people] want us to concede on.”
Mr Pasin said the Australian Government had received from China a “list of 14 matters” that, if corrected, would improve the relationship between the two countries.
“It disturbs me that one of those requests is to silence Members of Parliament like me and my colleagues and I don’t think that’s the kind of free and open Australia we want to live in,” he said.
“In my view; this is a decision that has been made to seek to influence political outcomes in Australia and I don’t think [people want] the Chinese Communist Party determining Australian Government policy,” Mr Pasin said.
Green Triangle Forest Industries Hub chairman Ian McDonnell said the long-term solution was to process the timber in Australia.
“We are a net importer of timber here. It’s critically important that when people go to the hardware store that they check that it’s from Australia,” he said.
Mr McDonnell wanted government incentives to encourage local manufacturing at new sawmills and pellet mills, such as payroll tax breaks and faster development approvals.
“Everybody is looking at what we can do long-term rather than just putting a Band-Aid on the China market,” said Mr McDonnell, who heads up Mount Gambier’s N.F. McDonnell & Sons sawmill.
The Australian Forest Products Association says it is aware of the suspension of the import of logs from Victoria and Queensland has been extended to Tasmania and South Australia.
The AFPA has worked extensively with industry and Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment to develop a comprehensive package of reforms to phytosanitary processes that it hopes will address the Chinese Government’s phytosanitary concerns and allow for the resumption of the log trade as soon as possible.
The alleged incidents that Chinese Customs has cited in relation to the Tasmania and South Australia suspensions predate the introduction of these tighter measures.
AFPA is also in ongoing discussions with Australian governments on the significant impact the suspension of the log trade is having across the forest industries supply chain.
The AFPA says that should the situation continue into 2021, the would be a need for short and long-term assistance to support workers and businesses already impacted, and to avoid further, widespread job losses and mill closures.
Assistant Minister for Forestry Jonathon Duniam said Chinese authorities had advised they had detected live pests of concern, including bark beetle, in consignments from five exporters, including one consignment from Tasmania.
“The Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment is working through officials in Beijing to clarify and resolve this,” he said.
“I am engaging closely with industry, and we are working at all levels to resolve these issues as soon as possible.”
Trade Minister Simon Birmingham told Federal parliament the government had raised the concerns directly with Beijing and left open the option of taking a complaint to the World Trade Organisation.
“These disruptions have increased significantly in recent months,” he said.
“The targeted nature of Chinese government (sanctions) on Australian goods raises concerns about China’s adherence to the letter and spirit of both its ChaFTA (China-Australia Free Trade Agreement) and WTO obligations.
“We continue to raise issues of apparent potential discriminatory actions targeted against Australia. The Australian government is considering old dispute settlement options in order to support our exporters and ensure they can compete on fair terms.”
Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union’s Brad Coates, who represents the Greater Green Triangle region, said forestry workers had already been stood down or put on extended leave due to China’s ban on Victoria.
He said 250 workers have so far been affected.
“There was some hope out there that this protracted dispute between Australia and China would be resolved sometime soon. But that seems to be unlikely with the announcements in the last couple of days,” he said.
“Some employers are just hanging on by the skin of their teeth — and are relying on JobKeeper.”
While the export ban had affected the industry in Western Victoria and South East South Australia, the fall-out would flow further, he said.
“There’s an amount of logs that get exported through Port Adelaide from forests north of Adelaide in the Adelaide Hills … it will have a significant effect on that industry,” Mr Coates said.
Mr Coates said the industry had been calling for government support.
“But the silence is deafening from both state and federal governments,” he said.
Mr Coates said the relationship between the Australian and Chinese governments had collapsed into a “war of words on Twitter”.
“To me, this doesn’t seem to be the best way to conduct diplomacy,” he said.
“The important point here is that that we need long-term strategies to support jobs and reduce our exposure [to] unreliable export markets like China.
“It’s almost like a perfect storm at the moment. If this timber dispute continues … then 1000 plus jobs could go.”
South Australian Shadow Forestry Minister Clare Scriven said urgent action was needed to help the industry ride through this trade crisis.
“This is a real concern for our region coming as it does on top of the products being targeted, such as wine and seafood, crayfish, as well as barley,” Ms Scriven said.
“We’re calling for the SA Marshall Liberal Government to establish an emergency taskforce to develop a plan because these are significant impacts on all of our local industries.
“This is a very urgent matter for our region and for the timber industry.”
