Logging in Wombat State Forest, near Daylesford and Trentham in Western Victoria, was shut down by concerned locals and activists on January 30, one of whom locked on to machinery.
Spokesperson for Wombat Action Group (WAG) Amy Calton criticised the Victorian government for resuming intensive industrial logging to the Wombat bio-diverse native forests, two decades after a community-led campaign had managed to get it protected.
Calton said Wombat Forestcare had, over two decades, finally forced the Dan Andrews government to promise to make Wombat a National Park 鈥減ermanently protecting it from the threats of extractive industries鈥.
Now, however, the future National Park 鈥渋s now being trashed by VicForests鈥.
She said the Victorian Supreme Court recently found that VicForests was not meeting legal requirements to protect the endangered greater glider. This meant that forestry operations in Eastern Victoria had to be shut down indefinitely.
鈥淗owever, in Wombat Forest, critical glider habitat is still being logged daily.
鈥淯nder the guise of salvage logging, VicForests operations in Wombat bear a disturbing resemblance to the past intensive shelter wood logging, where many live trees are being removed and the under-story totally obliterated,鈥 Calton said.
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