Australia's State of the Forest Report released
Friday 1 Nov 2024
The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and
Sciences (ABARES) has, this week, released Australia’s State of the Forests Report: Synthesis
2023.
ABARES Executive Director, Dr Jared Greenville, said
the five-yearly report covered all areas of Australia’s
forests—public and private forests, forests managed for
production and forests managed for conservation—and the full range
of social, economic and environmental values.
“Gaining a better understanding of our forests is a
crucial part of ensuring they are managed sustainably,”
Dr Greenville said. “That’s why this report is so
important—it provides the information that Australia’s
policy-makers and planners need if they are to plan continued growth
into the future."
- In 2021 Australia’s forest area was 134 million hectares and
has increased by 750 thousand hectares over the previous 5 years.
- Most of Australia’s forests are privately managed with 90.8
million hectares, or 68% of Australia’s forests, on leasehold or
privately owned tenures.
- The Indigenous forest estate is 80 million hectares, representing
60% of Australia’s total forest area. This is an increase of 10
million hectares since 2018.
- In 2022-23, the value of logs harvested from native forests and
commercial plantations was $2.4 billion, and the sector employed 51,123
workers in 2021, only slightly down compared to 2016.
- Over the period 2016-17 to 2020-21 the average annual area of
harvest from multiple-use native forest was 77 thousand hectares or
about 0.06% of Australia’s total area of native forest.
- A total of 49 million hectares (37 per cent) of Australia’s
native forest is on land protected for biodiversity conservation, or
where biodiversity conservation is a specified management intent.
- The most common threats to nationally listed forest-dwelling fauna
and flora include land-use change and/or forest loss; unsuitable fire
regimes; predation and competition by introduced fauna and flora; and
small or localised populations. Forestry operations were the least
prevalent of the 11 specified threat categories for listed forest-dwelling fauna and flora.
- Carbon stocks in Australia’s forests increased slightly to
19,417 million tonnes, during the period 2016 to 2021. In addition, in
2021, 167 million tonnes of carbon was present in harvested wood
products, a 5% increase since 2016.
SOFR Synthesis 2023 is the 6th in the series of five-yearly national
reports on Australia’s forests, and presents a new approach for
national reporting.
For more information please visit: Forests
Australia.
Source: Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource
Economics and Sciences (ABARES)
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