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Domestic Forestry
Under Australia's federal system, responsibility for management of forests rests with the state and territory governments. The Australian Government's role is to work with the state and territory governments and the forest industries on developing forest policy.
This partnership approach between governments and the industry is reflected through major policy initiatives such as the 1992 National Forestry Policy Statement and, the implementation of Plantations for Australia: The 2020 Vision.
Under these policy directions, Australia has spent more than ten years developing, implementing and reviewing a series of RFAs, and more recently to contributing to the expansion of the national plantation estate.
Now that the RFAs are in place, government and industry are looking to address emerging issues impacting on the future viability and sustainability of Australia's $19 billion forests industries.
Emerging issues include:
- assisting industry in adapting to climate change
- addressing industry skills shortages
- encouraging value adding to improve exports
- promoting world’s best practice
- maintaining access to key export markets
- cracking down on illegally logged timber imports
- certification and labelling
- the role of energy accreditation schemes
- government procurement policies and strategies, and
- resource management