With cursory public consultation and without independent reviews the commonwealth and states have committed to renew RFAs on a five-yearly rolling basis, effectively forever. This is despite most states late or failing to do required five-yearly reviews of these 20 year long federal/state govt agreements. Meanwhile logging impact on federally listed threatened species is contested in the supreme court. This article includes comments on the absurdity of having ‘theoretically’ strong commonwealth environmental law from which a whole section of the environment – forests – is exempted. Environmentalists, economists and politicians argue that RFAs have proven to be an environmental disaster.
Download Publication