A failure to implement effective erosion and sediment control measures at Tuckers Nob has resulted in Forestry Corporation of NSW being fined $15,000 by the NSW Environment Protection Authority. Sources: The Coffs Coast Advocate, ABC News
From September to November last year, FCNSW undertook clear-fell harvesting operations in Tuckers Nob State Forest followed by plantation re-establishment work which continued until late February.
The EPA’s regional manager Brett Nudd said not enough attention was paid to likely rainfall and soil loss during the logging, which ran from September 2014 until February this year.
“That activity involved whole scale removal of the vegetation, and exposed 95 hectares of land,” he said.
“There was a significant rainfall event that resulted in a significant volume of sediment being discharged into the Never Never Creek.
“The EPA conducted an investigation and has recently issued Forestry Corporation with a $15,000 penalty notice.
“The EPA investigation concluded that the erosion controls that were implemented were inadequate and that there was inappropriate or insufficient attention paid to the level of risk posed by the works at that time of year.
“Obviously significant rainfall events happen on the coast quite often at that time of the year.”
‘A slap on the wrist’ is how the North Coast Environment Council (NCEC) is describing the penalty notice. The Environment Council spokeswoman Susie Russell says a $15,000 fine will not prevent similar events.
“These kind of fines don’t have a big impact,” she said.
“We want to see some transparency around the negotiations between the EPA and Forestry that are going to open up our forests to clear felling.
“We don’t want to see licence conditions made into guidelines which allows them to be optional and pollution events just become an unfortunate collateral damage from doing business.”
Ms Russell said the EPA would never have known about the logging problem if local residents had not raised the alert after pollution was spotted in the creek at the Never Never picnic ground.
“To do that right next to a public amenity area is of course a particularly stupid thing,” she said.
“But this kind of thing is happening right across the region and is not being picked up by the EPA. “What is of more concern is that the EPA is currently in negotiations with the Forestry Corporation to allow it to conduct major clear-fells of native forest right across the Mid North Coast.”
Greens MP and Forestry spokesperson David Shoebridge said the Forestry Corporation of NSW had engaged in “shameful” practices at Tuckers Nob State Forest.
He said the fine issued is not equal to the amount of damage caused.
“I saw for myself how the corporation clear felled this native forest and left the open soil to be washed into the local waterways,” Mr Shoebridge said.
“The Never Never Creek is an environmental jewel, as are the beautiful forests of the Mid North Coast, but they all being savaged by the unthinking practices of the Forestry Corporation.”
