“Right now, what we don’t have are clear-cut guarantees on the amount of wood we can continue to supply into the future from our diminishing native forests,” lamented fourth-generation Tasmanian sawmiller Wayne Booth.
“But what we do have is membership of Wood Connect which makes private certification through brands such as Responsible Wood far more accessible and guarantees our sustainable management practices.”
Wayne says without this certification, “we’d have to shut up shop.”
The sawmill supplies most of its timber to Melbourne wholesalers—appearance-grade flooring, panelling, architraves, and skirting boards—who feed demand from the big mainland warehouses such as Bunnings and Mitre 10, which have a policy that all products originating from natural forests must come from third-party certified forests.
“But our certification credentials through Wood Connect go beyond this,” Wayne said. “They give us a feeling of personal responsibility for our timbers – that they are legal … and honest. So, we’re ahead of the game there.”
Certification, a voluntary market-driven process, has two components: forest management certification and chain-of-custody certification. While forest management is essential to achieving certification, it doesn’t end there. The entire supply chain must meet the same high standards.
Six generations of the Booth family have worked in the Tasmanian sawmilling industry. The family-owned Karanja Timbers, an integrated sawmill 45 km from Hobart, was built in 1956 and totally rebuilt in the 1990s. Over the years, it has drawn sustainable hardwoods from native forests… “our renewable energy storehouses.”
Wayne, 63, who started at the sawmill in 1991, says he will “hang in there for as long as it takes” with support from his wife, son Christopher, and grandson Ryan, who brings the sixth generation to the family’s full life in sawmilling.
A strong, experienced and devoted backstop to the team is Wayne’s father Trevor, 85, who still comes every day to work at the sawmill.
Like all the family, and with more than 60 years drawing supply from native forests that have flourished in perpetuity, he is bewildered by the negativity of governments and conservation groups about the science and practice of planting, managing and caring for forests.
Wayne Booth said it was not so long ago he was supplying more than 14,000 cub m of timber a year, mostly eucalypt regnans, or giant ash or swamp gum as we call them down here, from the Central Highlands.
“With reduced access to native forests, this has dropped to 3000 cub m, with a state government suggesting sawmillers consider converting to plantation timbers.”
He says among mixed opinions there has been a suggestion sawmills consider switching totally to plantation timbers, or we run our business on a cycle of half native timber and half plantations.
“This is a half-baked idea,” Wayne said. “This lofty alternative of switching to plantation timbers would mean a total and very costly overhaul of all our sawmilling machinery and equipment that was designed and built to process larger native hardwood logs.
“And the half-and-half idea would mean we would have to install not one but two separate stations at the sawmill to process different log sizes. So, consider the cost of that.”
Wayne added: “It’s only my opinion, but I am sure most, if not all, sawmillers in Tassie would reject these ideas and methods. At best, or worse, it must be one or the other – all plantations or all native forests.
“At the moment it’s a roll-of-the dice game, but with Wood Connect our credentials remain sure and sound.”
The family will wait until Christmas to consider the sawmill’s future – be it long term or short term.
- For more information about Wood Connect, visit the Wood Connect website for more information or contact the operators here.
