Public Cost, Private Gain: New Report Reveals Shocking Misuse of Public Funds as Renewal of Logging Contracts Loom

This morning Wilderness Society Tasmania released Public Cost, Private Gain, a new report documenting decades of financial and environmental mismanagement by the Tasmanian Government and the native forest logging industry. 

The report provides detailed analysis of market trends of the declining native forest logging industry and forewarns of potential further enormous taxpayer payouts, should the reckless move to lock in long-term contracts to 2040 be finalised in the coming months in spite of the supply uncertainty due to federal environmental regulatory changes. 

Public Cost, Private Gain is a damning exposé authored by economics researcher Andy Bakonyi and forest ecologist Dr Jen Sanger. The report finds that Tasmania’s native forest logging industry has for decades been sustained by extensive state and federal government intervention. Since the late 1980s, governments have committed more than $1.25 billion to keep this subsidy dependent industry alive. Rather than operating on a commercially viable footing, the sector has relied on repeated rounds of public assistance to offset persistent structural weaknesses.

The report builds on vast evidence of elite cartel corruption by major logging companies operating in Tasmania and debunks claims made by mainstream politicians and the native forest logging industry that it is essential to the Tasmanian economy. For example, while native forest logging is often justified on the basis of sawlog supply and domestic manufacturing, the majority of timber harvested from public native forests is processed into low-value products for export. Further, contrary to claims, reduced native forest sawmilling has not increased imports, and Australia exported more than twice as much hardwood as it imported in 2023.

The report concludes that the Tasmanian native forest logging industry cannot compete with plantation forestry or global markets, and that an end to the practice is inevitable without even further taxpayer subsidies. The continued logging of Tasmania’s public native forests reflects policy settings that no longer align with market realities, environmental limits, or long-term public value. The report adds to recent polling that found only 12% of Tasmanians support native forest logging, putting forward a strong mandate: Tasmanians do not want or need destructive native forest logging.

“This report shows Tasmania’s native forest logging industry only survives because taxpayers keep bailing it out. More than a billion dollars has been poured into an industry that is not economically viable, while public forests are logged for low-value exports. Locking in new long-term contracts would double down on a failed model that Tasmanians do not support and do not need,” said Hugh Nicklason, Forest Campaigner at Wilderness Society Tasmania.

Forest Ecologist Dr Jennifer Sanger, co-author of the report, states: “The Tasmanian Government is rushing to sign long-term logging contracts just as changes to the EPBC Act are likely to restrict or shut down these operations. This is a familiar and costly mistake: when the rules change, governments pay millions to cancel the very contracts they are now locking in. Propping up an unviable industry while gambling with public money is reckless, wasteful, and unfair to Tasmanian taxpayers.”