New South Wales, Australia, has no plans to create carbon sink plantations, Forests NSW land management, forestry services director says timber remains core business

Wendy Lisney

DUNEDIN, New Zealand , November 4, 2011 (Friday Offcuts) – ABC Rural reports that the NSW Government's forestry operators have no plans for creating carbon sink plantations under the current regulatory and market conditions. Their five-year-old carbon sequestration business earns around AU$3 million a year from the softwood and hardwood plantations established on former farmlands since 1990.

But Dr Ross Dickson, from Forests NSW, says timber remains the core business. "Potentially there could be a time when there are dedicated carbon forests that aren't actually grown for timber (and are) simply there for sequestering carbon, but I think that is still a little way off." Dr Dickson says market prices fluctuated for the carbon offsets from AU$12 per tonne five years ago to AU$3 per tonne now.

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