Forests - the foodstock for the future

There is a certain righteousness in using sustainable resources. In fact as Ric Sinclair, Managing Director of the Forests and Wood Products Association recently said "sustainably sourced forest and wood products will be the foodstock for a new bio-economy in a carbon-constrained world of the future". At the 2012 annual Forest Products Association conference few disagreed with this statement

But how can this be provided for under current circumstances. For example in the Forests NSW Central Region, which extends from Gosford to Kempsey and West to Armidale and Tamworth, there is over 1.26M Ha of National Park, 400 000ha of native State Forest and 9000ha of State Forest eucalypt plantation. Over 1/3 of the State Forest is protected by reserves and prescriptions and will never be harvested.

This means that 83% of government owned forest is protected in this region with only 17% available for harvest.