Development of a new Timber Industry Strategy for Victoria

Background l Objectives l Scope l Development process – formal written submissions

Background On 19 March 2008, the Minister for Agriculture announced that in 2008, the Victorian Government is developing a new Timber Industry Strategy which will provide a framework and long-term direction for the Victorian timber industry for the next 20 years, read the Media Release (external link). The following two reports are important inputs into development of the Strategy. Note that these reports reflect the available information and prevailing conditions at the time of their preparation: Victoria's Sustainable Advantage: Recommendations for a new Timber Industry Strategy for Victoria (STIC) (PDF 920kb) Analysis of the Victorian forestry and forest products industry (PDF 576kb)

Objectives

Our Objectives for the Strategy are:

• To maximise economic value to Victoria from production and processing of timber (plantations and native forests, on public and private land) in a socially and environmentally sustainable manner. This entails:
  • securing the resource base through a regulatory framework that provides for ongoing investment certainty in the timber industry; and
  • providing an environment that is conducive to sustainable investment and employment within the timber industry and also promotes innovation and value-adding.
  
  
• To assist the timber industry to adapt to environmental, social and economic change. This entails:
  • helping forest managers and dependent industries to adapt to the potential implications of climate change, including greater frequency of fire events and less water; and
  • facilitating the development and commercialisation of new and emerging markets including for carbon, renewable energy production and other ecosystem services.
  • examining the role of the growing plantation resource in the forest products industry.

• Victorian Government institutional, governance and organisational arrangements;
• sustainable yield, area and volume of resource available from public native forests (State forests)
• the VicForests Price Allocation Model
• long rotation plantations and private native forests to augment existing resources from public native forests
• industry investment and development
• emerging markets including renewable energy production and an emissions trading scheme
• Occupational Health and Safety in the harvest and haulage and processing sectors
• government procurement policies and procedures including building codes
• training and skills development; and
• research and development.