Australia’s Honey Bee Industry has backed Australia’s Regional Forest Agreement (RFA) framework as the best way of ensuring our multi-use forests are sustainably managed to benefit the whole community.
Australian Forest Products Association (AFPA) CEO, Mr Ross Hampton, welcomed the Australian Honey Bee Industry Council’s (AHBIC) media release today committing to work with the forestry industry on ensuring that RFAs in Victoria and nationally continue, so that our state forests remain accessible to our industries.
The AHBIC’s media release follows the misrepresentation of the bee industry’s views in a story last week by The Guardian and ABC. In the release, AHBIC Chair, Mr Peter McDonald, said:
The Australian Honey Bee Industry Council has expressed concern over the misrepresentation of its views about sustainable forest management, which benefits the community at large.
Well managed multi-use forests involving forestry, beekeeping, and recreation will always deliver the best conservation, economic and social outcomes.
Mr Hampton said the statement from the Honey Bee Industry shows it is happy to work constructively with sustainably managed native forest operations and that the media reports last week were grossly misleading.
“Australia’s native forest industry will continue to work with the Bee Industry to ensure better outcomes for both sectors,” Mr Hampton said.
“What our industries need is long-term certainty that we will continue to have access to sustainably-managed state forests for the range of social, environmental and economic benefits that only multi-use forests can provide. The Victorian Government must end the uncertainty and commit to a 20-year extension to the state’s three RFAs, just as NSW and Tasmania have,” Mr Hampton concluded.