Fire Salvage

Wildfires have affected just over 3.4 million hectares of Victoria's forests in the past 8 years with large fires in 2002/03; 2006/07 and 2009.

As a result, salvage harvesting has become an important part of VicForests' role with just over 3500 hectares of forest salvaged as a consequence of these fires.

Salvage harvesting is the logging of dead trees which have been burnt by bushfire.

The major benefits of this process include ensuring that timber destroyed by bushfire is utilised and the need to harvest ‘green' or unburnt forest is reduced.

• The 2009 Black Saturday bushfires burnt approximately 400 000 hectares of forest. In 2009, VicForests has harvested approximately 800 hectares of salvage timber from trees killed by these fires with up to another 1000 hectares expected to be harvested in 2010.

• All VicForests salvage harvesting operations comply with strict environmental standards, and take place following extensive assessment of fire affected areas.

• All areas harvested are regenerated with eucalypt seed native to the local environment.

• Each hectare of salvage harvested forest means one less hectare of ‘green' forest is harvested.

• Over the past years, VicForests has worked with the Australian National University and the Department of Sustainability and Environment to improve our systems that aim to protect the different environmental values that are present in salvage areas.

• The timber gained from salvage harvesting is not in addition to our allocation; rather, it replaces harvesting in unburnt areas that are left to continue to grow. This timber is used for flooring, housing, furniture, paper and many other uses.