But a far as fools go nothing beat the QLD goverment on its sale Queensland's forests.
Queensland has by far the largest forested area of all Australian states with 52.8 million hectares of forest covering almost one-third of the state. More than 80 per cent of these forests are State-owned, and are managed under tenures including leasehold land (34.3 million hectares) and nature conservation reserves (4.6 million hectares).
Some 3 million hectares of declared State forests, timber reserves and State leasehold land is currently available for native forest timber production, with less than four per cent of this area selectively harvested in any one year.
Timber production in Queensland is also undertaken in some private native forests and in dedicated public and private timber plantations.
Queensland timber industry Queensland’s timber industry comprises about 2200 businesses and directly employs more than 19 000 people. It has a turnover of $2.7 billion, value-adds about $1 billion to the State’s economy, and earns around $215 million each year in overseas export income.
For more information, see the website of the peak industry representative body, Timber Queensland.
The former Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries' publication, The Queensland forest industry, though published in 2004, still provides a useful reference for information on the commercial growing, management and processing of commercial forest products in Queensland. The publication predates the reorganisation of forest management responsibilities.
In 2006, Queensland Government reforms to the former Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries business group, DPI Forestry, led to the formation of two new forest management agencies. DERM Forest Products now manages commercial native forest production on State-controlled lands across Queensland and Forestry Plantations Queensland Pty Ltd (FPQ Pty Ltd) manages timber production on State plantation forest lands across the state.
On 30 June 2010, the Queensland Government sold FPQ Pty Ltd to Hancock Queensland Plantations Pty Ltd through a 99-year licence agreement. of the forestry.
