Firewood sales draws protestors

Environmentalists descended on Bunbury yesterday protesting against the sale of jarrah trees more than 400 years old to firewood contractors.

During the past financial year more than 61,000 tonnes of firewood logs were produced by the Forest Products Commission.

Carbon dating done by the University of Waikato in New Zealand showed a sample of firewood log, taken by the WA Forest Alliance, was 430 years old.

The Alliance is an umbrella organisation for a number of environmental groups and said its members would be upgrading its campaign to end native forest logging.

A Forest Products Commission spokesman said the age in years of trees was not taken into account when harvested.

‘‘The king jarrah trees are identified for long-term protection,’’ the spokesman said.

It is difficult to measure the age of jarrah trees but it is believed the harvested trees can range from 250 to 450 years old.

‘‘Mature trees could remain standing after it has died and, if measuring with carbon dating, the wood in the middle of the tree would continue to age,’’ the spokesman said.

The alliance said the commission was selling the logs to contractors for $9 to $13 a tonne before the trees were chopped into firewood for the domestic market.

Alliance spokeswoman Jess Beckerling said South West forests were worth more standing than used as firewood.

‘‘We will be upgrading our campaign to protect our native forests and are calling on Premier Colin Barnett to urgently review his outdated and economically irrational forest policy,’’ Ms Beckerling said.

‘‘It is staggering how little this government values our natural heritage and wild places.

‘‘All this makes it very clear that all is not well in our forests.’’

The commission spokesman said timber in use, such as railway sleepers, furniture structural timber products, also stored carbon.

‘‘When it comes to carbon storage we think about whole forests and not individual trees,’’ the spokesman said.