Harvesting

VicForests harvests approximately 5500 hectares of native forest each year. This equates to less than 0.1% of the total 7.8 million hectares of native forest in Victoria.¹

VicForests ensures the sustainability of our operations in a number of ways including:

By harvesting less than 0.1% of forest each year we are leaving at least 99.9% to continue growing.

VicForests is legislated by the Victorian Government's Sustainable Forests (Timber) Act 2004. We are regularly audited by independent auditors to check that we are complying with these standards. We have been certified to the Australian Forestry Standard (AFS), which is aligned to the global Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC), the largest certification system in the world.

We replant all the areas that are harvested. Our regeneration operations use seed local to the area, and our staff regularly monitor sites to ensure all the tree species that were present before harvesting, return. The forest area is returned to the Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) for ongoing management once strict regeneration standards have been achieved.

We continue to work with DSE and external research organisations to develop our understanding of forest behaviour. After each large fire, we review the areas burnt and adjust our sustainable harvest yields accordingly.

We provide direct employment for over 130 staff and engage approximately 150 contractors. The greater Victorian timber industry employs 25,500 people, mainly located in rural and regional communities

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