What is going on with Victoria’s forests? Luke Chamberlain update

Feb 21, 2026 | Carbon offsets, Climate Policy, Environmental protection, Forests

Significant native forests logging in Victorian forests - Croajingolong National Park

What is really going on with Victoria’s forests?

An update from veteran forests campaigner Luke Chamberlain

In our recent webinar Why Forests Matter, Luke Chamberlain from Environmental Justice Australia gives us an inside view on what is really happening to Victoria’s native forests post Victoria’s native forest “logging ban”, and discusses the proposed Timber Fibre Strategy in the context of his work in Europe building a coalition against biomass burning for energy.

Luke Chamberlain explained in detail how Victoria's forests are under threat, and how the situation is worse in many ways with FFMV than Vic Forests

Luke Chamberlain explained in detail how Victoria’s forests are under threat, and how the situation is worse in many ways with FFMV than Vic Forests

 

More from Forests Matter, solving biosphere and climate crises webinar with Virginia Young and Luke Chamberlain:

February 18 Why forests matter for climate

Learn more about the pivotal role forests play in climate action and preserving biodiversity – watch here

 

Logging has continued in Victorian native forests

Victoria’s forests matter globally

Victoria's cool temperate forests are rich in biodiversity and globally significant carbon storage

Victoria’s cool temperate forests are rich in biodiversity and globally significant carbon storage

Victoria’s forests are very important.  In areas with high biodiversity, Victorian forests are the most carbon dense on the planet. You can see the areas of the highest biodiversity in this recent Victorian Environmental Assessment Council survey.

 

In Europe, only 5% of Europe’s forests are over 100 years old, only 2% are primary forest, and 30% are made up of a single species. A recent Victorian Environmental Assessment Council report found that the highest areas for biodiversity are in the Central Highlands, South Gippsland and East Gippsland, some of the very highest carbon storage globally. After decades of bipartisan support, the Victorian Environmental Assessment Council is being abolished by Labor.

East Gippsland contains almost a third of Victoria’s threatened species, and rare plants and animals found nowhere else on Earth.

East Gippsland contains almost a third of Victoria’s threatened species, and rare plants and animals found nowhere else on Earth.

 

Conservationists are pushing for permanent protection for forests in East Gippsland with the Emerald Link, connecting “forests, culture and communities. Our vision is a stronger regional economy that celebrates biodiversity, restores landscapes, and welcomes visitors to experience East Gippsland’s natural icons.”

The Great Forest National Park could attract an extra 400,000 visitors annually to the area, creating an additional 750 full-time jobs and adding more than $70 million to the local economy annually

The Great Forest National Park could attract an extra 400,000 visitors annually to the area, creating an additional 750 full-time jobs and adding more than $70 million to the local economy annually

The formation of The Great Forest National Park, just at the end of the Eastern Freeway, in the Central Highlands of Victoria, home to the world’s tallest flowering plant, the Mountain Ash, and the critically endangered Leadbeaters Possum: both “are threatened by ongoing clearfell logging and wildfires. The creation of the Great Forest National Park would not only safeguard the habitats of endangered species and protect these critical forests, but also protect carbon stocks, water supplies, and lower the risk of bushfires.”

The establishment of The Great Forest National Park has been valued by luminaries such as Sir David Attenborough and Jane Goodall and Prof David Bellamy. Victoria’s forests are homes to the tallest flowering plants on the planet, and Greater Gliders, Sugar Gliders and Powerful Owls.

 

Old growth forests are so much more than just stands of trees

Mature undisturbed temperate forests are carbon dense and naturally fire resistant

As we have learnt from decades of internationally recognised work from David Lindenmayer and Phil Zylstra, tall dense damp forests are naturally fire resistant if they are not disturbed.

 

Logging, where this is clear felling, selective logging or fire breaks damages forest integrity

Forests disturbed with selective, salvage logging or clear felling have elevated flammability. Natural fire resistance can take up to eighty years to return.

 

 

The Timber Fibre Strategy will allow logging to expand

Context – biomass  burning is the largest form of “renewable energy” in Europe

Even though the atmosphere sees the emissions from burning forest wood, nevertheless it has been deemed zero emissions.

Even though the atmosphere sees the emissions from burning forest wood, nevertheless it has been deemed zero emissions, and is degrading EU’s ability to store carbon

In Europe, the main form of “renewable” energy is unfortunately biomass  – burning old growth forests – which can’t be regenerated quickly or easily, if at all. If burning wood was a country, it would be the 5th highest emitter in the EU, but is accounted as zero emissions, and is degrading EU land sinks.

We must make sure that Victoria doesn’t follow Europe’s example in burning forests for energy

The timber industry shaped the Timber Fibre Strategy  as a vehicle to allow public subsidies to chop down forests to burn for energy and count this as “renewable” in Australia, despite clear evidence that at least a third of logging coupes do not regenerate, but turn into “weed-infested wastelands of blackberry and bracken, and others into thickets of wattle not eucalypts.”

The Timer Fibre Strategy aims to remove the current illegibility of native timber, and offers yet another way to sink more public money to prop up a loss making industry – Albanese has offered $300m to implement this.

The timber industry is strategy that would expand logging into national parks for investment in energy that would be recognised as renewable

The timber industry is strategy that would expand logging into national parks for investment in energy that would be recognised as renewable

 

 

The Allan government appears to be undermining the native logging ban

In 2023 Premier Andrews established In 2023 Premier Andrews established a ban on native forest logging. However under the Premier Allan states “I won’t be putting a padlock on our forests” and “The government will not be creating any new national parks”, despite the promise of 1.8m hectares of protected forests at the end of native logging, and Victoria’s status as the most cleared state in the country.

“There are major gaps in our reserve system, ecological classes, that are way below what governments have committed to.”

Luke Chamberlain, EJA

There has been an incredible shift in nature policy since 2023, when Premier Andrews instituted the native logging ban and promised to expand reserves

There has been an incredible shift in nature policy since 2023, when Premier Andrews instituted the native logging ban and promised to expand reserves

In Victoria, National Parks and forests are under siege

Despite a $1.5bn of public funding, the State government has removed oversight, expanded loogging under FFMV and gutted scientific advisory bodies

Despite a $1.5bn of public funding, the State government has removed oversight, expanded loogging under FFMV and gutted scientific advisory bodies

$1.5bn has been ‘invested’ on the native forest transition, but not a single tree in Eastern Victoria has been protected. The promise to create the Great Forest National Park has been abandoned, as has the promise to expand forest reserves, and ignored Great Outdoors Taskforce recommendations to legislate the ban have ignored, and shooters have been sent into the last places they were not allowed in Eastern Victoria. Important advisory bodies like the VEAC, and Marine and Coastal councils have been abolished and 200 biodiversity staff sacked.

Forest Fire Management (FFMV) has expanded logging with no oversight

“Vic Forests contractors are working with the same bulldozers, the same chainsaws in the same forests, not for Vic Forests anymore but for Forest Fire Managment.”

Luke Chamberlain, EJA

There is now anti national parks framing through land management, fisheries staff have been sacked and Parks Victoria upended.

Has native logging really ended?

These publicly available images show clearly that that logging trucks are not carrying plantation logs, proving that native forest logging has not ended but continues

These publicly available images show clearly that that logging trucks are not carrying plantation logs, proving that native forest logging has not ended but continues

There is a lot of public evidence that logging has not ended – from streams of logging trucks filled with native timber, not plantation timber, on public cameras, to “the same” evidence of new clear felling under FFMV, “because now they are allowed to do it in national parks too”, even specifically targeting hollow bearing trees.

To experienced campaigners, the FFMV looks very similar to previous clear felling in coupe by coupe

To experienced campaigners, the FFMV looks very similar to previous clear felling in coupe by coupe, and the huge tree on the bottom right from a national park in the Central Highlands, which had “known residents of Greater Gliders before it was cut down”.

The Heyfield Mill is significant, with visual evidence of it working at capacity.

The Heyfield mill is full to the brim with native logs, despite millions of dollars in public subsidies in the name of transition

The Heyfield mill is full to the brim with native logs, despite millions of dollars in public subsidies in the name of transition

 

Southern Tasmanian native timber is being trucked to Central Vic and milled in the Powelltown Mill.

Transition money has gone into buying up land which is now being logged, and salvage logging is still happening, for instance in the Wombat forest which should have been part of a new national park, “but we are going in and logging it first”.

There is clear evidence that FFMV is not just burning but also cutting timber, but due to lack of disclosure requirements, we are not being informed of where the timnber is going

There is clear evidence that FFMV is not just burning but also cutting timber, but due to lack of disclosure requirements, we are not being informed of where the timnber is going

 

FFMV is still cutting timber and mills are still receiving wood, despite no real documentation of what is happening.

Intact forest is fire resilient - most fires are the result of human activity, but the label bushfire allows social licence to mutlilate the bush

Intact forest is fire resilient – most fires are the result of human activity, but the label bushfire allows “social licence to mutlilate the bush”, as you can see with these “track maintenance” images

 

What can we do about this?

What are we doing about the new challenge to the integrity of Victoria’s Forests? 

Environmental Justice Australia is supporting Warburton Environment’s Federal case against the State government’s logging of hollow bearing trees in the Central Highlands by FFMV, seeking protective court orders. “Court documents filed by WE allege the logging of hollow-bearing trees by the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action (DEECA) is a federal offence under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC Act).” The case is now waiting judgement – you can support Warburton Environment here.

“Represented by Barrister Jonathan Korman, Warburton Environment alleges the Victorian Government ignored warnings it was breaching federal environment laws by logging large hollow-bearing trees home to endangered Southern greater gliders and critically endangered Leadbeater’s Possums.”

Warburton Environment

The EJA is supporting Warburton Environment in its case against the State Government to protect our native forests

The EJA is supporting Warburton Environment in its case against the State Government to protect our native forests. The Labor government seems to be putting the interests of shooters and loggers ahead of the wider community..

 

 

 

Formation of Nature Alliance to reclaim parks for nature

Community engagement is critical in working to protect our very important forests. Just as in Europe, we can come together as organisations and as individuals to work to protect our forests and forest animals from logging and reclaim safe uses of parks.

The VPNA and EJA and other groups at a Future Parks forum formed a Nature Alliance to protect our National Parks

The VPNA and EJA and other groups at a Future Parks forum formed a Nature Alliance “to reclaim our National Parks, and the carbon and biodiversity stored in those” and work to protect unprotected forests.

More abut Luke Chamberlain

Luke Chamberlain is a campaign and policy officer at Environmental Justice Australia.  Luke is “building momentum to permanently protect Victoria’s forests beyond the end to most native forest logging in the state”, and previously worked in the EU, building an alliance of over 120 organisations “to protect forests from being burned for so-called renewable energy”, and is still working against biomass burning in the US and the EU.

Luke has decades of experience in fighting for the protection of native forests in Australia and internationally, including with the Wilderness Society.

 

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