A globally trusted source of forest products

by Bob Gordon - Managing Director

Forestry Tasmania's focus is shifting from being an internationally competitive land manager to being a globally trusted source of certified timber products and services.


The shift in the company's corporate vision was part of the launch of our new vision, mission, set of corporate objectives, and values at a breakfast in Launceston this week.

The changes reflect changing community values.

The old corporate statements no longer reflect who we are as a business. The old statements over-emphasised the profit motive and under-emphasised our commitment to social and environmental outcomes.

The changes are best illustrated by the revised corporate objectives. Under the old, the first corporate objective was to improve profit performance and returns to shareholders.

This objective implied that the business might be prepared to sacrifice good sound environmental management for a quick buck. That is not how we operate. Our business operates over 90 year time frames, and the profit result from one year to the next is not how we should be judged.

We should be judged on how we use science to manage the forests so they deliver jobs, wealth, environmental and social outcomes for not only this generation, but for our kids and their kids.

Our aim should not be to make an obscene profit this year, but to make sure that we are cutting at a slower rate than the forest is growing, and that we are regenerating every patch of harvested forest, so that in 90 years there will be more forest, not less.

For that reason, the first corporate objective is not to increase profit, but to embrace science to achieve best practice environmental stewardship.

This does not mean we intend to stop returning a dividend to the community. In fact, the opposite is true. It will make our business more sustainable, environmentally and economically.

Values and profit are not mutually exclusive, rather, you cannot have one without the other.

The new objectives reflect the fact that Forestry Tasmania values its staff and customers, is approachable and a responsible forest manager, but at the same time continues to be an important driver of the State’s economy and a trusted source of timber products.

The changes that have been made by Forestry Tasmania include the cessation of the use of 1080 in public forests and conversion of native forest to plantation; the move away from clearfelling in old growth forests; the increase in downstream processing and the investment in wedge tailed eagle protection.

Forestry Tasmania has also operated in a more transparent way in recent times.

Last year we opened the battered brief case. We commenced annual community forums. We commenced regular open days and tours of head office. We developed a community access bus to make FT more accessible. We post all FoI requests on our website and we've tried to open dialogue with conservationists.

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