02/06/2026
Myth Buster No. 2 - "Harvesting native forests threatens biodiversity, especially endangered fauna"
Flowing from the implementation of the National Forest Policy Statement (NFPS 1992) through Regional Forest Agreements, progressively signed between 1997 and 2001 there were major increases in the size of the conservation estate. This included the development of a Comprehensive Adequate and Representative (CAR) reserve system to protect wilderness, old growth forests and rare and endangered species. The CAR system is supplemented by ‘off reserve’ contributions to biodiversity in native forests managed for multiple uses including wood production and by some privately owned forests.
Many aspects of biodiversity in Australia are in a state of decline (State of the Environment Australia 2021), with primary threats being from land clearing for farming, urban development, feral pests and high-intensity wildfires. Forest management is ranked low amongst threats to forest dwelling flora and fauna (Davey 2018b; Ward et al. 2021; ABARES 2023c; Satyanti and Read 2025).
Despite this, organisations such as WWF, the Wilderness Society and the ACBF repeatedly allege that harvesting native forests destroys important biodiversity and that its continuation will lead to species decline and even extinction. Poor science has been used to back many such assertions. For example, Ward et al. (2024) assumed that if forests are harvested there will be negative impacts on threatened fauna. However, that analysis for northern NSW did not provide any map showing actual forest degradation after harvesting; they simply inferred major threats to fauna wherever there was an overlap between modelled species distributions and harvested areas. Further, no account was taken of the facts that only small areas of forest are harvested annually, that forests regrow, habitat is continually changing over time, and that harvesting practices are modified specifically to avoid or minimise any such impacts. Taylor, Evans, et al. (2025) used similar flawed logic, without direct evidence and concluded that certified harvesting operations were adversely impacting biodiversity in areas that they considered needed to be added to the protected area.
Extensive research (e.g. on koalas) provides reliable information to guide forest management. The iconic koala is listed as endangered in the Australian Capital Territory, NSW and Queensland. Some conservationists claim that koalas are under further threat from timber harvesting, but robust research disproves this. Law et al. (2022, 2024) monitored koala populations at 224 sites over 7 years and concluded that well-regulated timber harvesting or low severity fire did not reduce koala occupancy rates, and harvesting prescriptions ‘provided sufficient habitat for koalas to maintain their density, both immediately after selective harvesting and within 5–10 years after heavy harvesting’.
Recent extensive aerial surveys (involving ~4000 km of drone flights) in northern NSW suggest that koala densities and occupancy are similar in National Parks and adjacent harvested forests, and the same type of results was found for southern greater gliders (NSW Department of CCEEW 2025a, 2025b). A synthesis based on further extensive surveys across forest types and tenures (NSW Department of CCEEW 2025) estimated that there are 274,000 koalas across NSW and confirmed large numbers, widely distributed on the north coast of NSW. A CSIRO study (2024) found that nationally koala numbers may be up to 10-fold greater than estimated by the Australian Koala Foundation in 2021. An update (CSIRO 2025) reported that population numbers had increased substantially in the previous year, partly due to improved detection techniques and more extensive surveys.
The above studies collectively show that koalas in NE NSW are not threatened by timber harvests, and they are relatively abundant in these forests. Extensive wildfire poses a threat to koala populations. The above findings raise questions about the likely benefit to koala conservation from the proposed Great Koala National Park (GKNP). This Park would further restrict sustainable harvesting of native forests and negatively impact timber-dependent rural communities in NE NSW.
A widely used argument for banning timber harvesting mountain ash forest in Victoria is that harvesting is a threat to Leadbeater’s possum (e.g. Lindenmayer et al. 1990), although this view has been vigorously challenged (e.g. Attiwill 1994, 1995; Poynter and Ryan 2018). The debate centres around the loss of key habitat, especially large old hollow-bearing trees required for nesting and breeding. But, during the last 3 decades there has been no harvest of old growth forests, and managers make special efforts to protect old trees within the harvested area of regrowth forests.
A recent report (DCCEEW 2024) provided a comprehensive coverage of the habitat requirements of the possum and reasons for the listing of the species as critically endangered. It concluded that the main threats to the species have been historical timber harvesting and a major wildfire in 2009 which has decreased the extent, quality and connectivity of suitable habitat. It needs to be emphasised that there will also be natural on-going loss of old trees over time irrespective of the impact of other disturbances. The possums require hollow bearing trees, but also younger regenerating forests to provide appropriate food source and movement pathways (Lindenmayer et al. 1990) – harvesting and effective regeneration facilitates this. The projected future decline in Leadbeater’s possum numbers is based on modelled decline in the number of hollow-bearing trees, not on empirical evidence of decline across the forest estate and does not account for new habitat developing elsewhere as forests regrow and age after disturbance.
Nelson et al. (2017) found a high occurrence of possums in regrowth forests regenerated after harvest. Surveys using better detection methods show that the number of sites with confirmed sightings has increased, suggesting that the species may be more widespread than previously recognised, more numerous than once thought, and not restricted to old growth forests. Recently, the species has been found in forests in southern New South Wales. Total numbers are likely to exceed 2500–10 000 with potential habitat increasing from 200 000 ha to 300 000 ha (DCCEEW 2024). More systematic and comprehensive surveys across all relevant forest tenures are needed to better inform future forest management to protect this species – similar to the approaches outlined earlier that provided reliable evidence on the distribution of koalas and the impacts of harvesting and wildfire. The recent national recovery plan for Leadbeater’s possum (DCCEEW 2024) provides a review of new population detection methods that can be applied over extensive areas and key strategies for management. Our overall conclusion is that the impact, if any, arising from contemporary forest management including timber harvesting on Leadbeater’s possum populations has not been clearly established. Thus, there is inadequate justification for using the alleged impacts of harvesting on the possum population as a reason for banning sustainable harvesting of very small areas of mountain ash forests in Victoria.
Grove (2026) showed, based on critical analysis of relevant science, that predation by sugar gliders and not (as widely claimed) sustainable harvesting of native forests is the critical factor driving a rapid decline in numbers of swift parrots in southeastern Australia. He concluded that ‘focusing outrage on forestry operations is a displacement activity which gives no material conservation benefits for swift parrots, while distracting from the pressing need to find means of curbing sugar glider predation’.
The State of the Forest Report (MPIGA and NFISC 2024) found that 1227 native forest-dwelling species (244 vertebrate fauna and 983 vascular flora are listed as threatened; the six most common threats are: landuse change and/or forest-loss, unsuitable fire regimes, predation by introduced fauna, competition from invasive fauna and flora, small or localised populations and presence of mortality agents. Forestry operations (long-term cycles of harvesting and regrowth) were the lowest ranked threat, and no extinction of fauna or flora has been attributed to multiple-use forest management including sustainable timber production.
Source: extract from R. J. Raison, E. K. S. Nambiar, G. A. Kile & L. J. Bren (27 May 2026): Australia’s native forests can be sustainably managed for wood production together with other important forest values, Australian Forestry, DOI: 10.1080/00049158.2026.2663997
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/udeiimzwk2jyban3y8ynu/Australia-s-native-forests-can-be-sustainably-managed-for-wood-production-together-with-other-important-forest-values.-Raison-Nambiar-Kile-and-Bren.-May-2026..pdf?rlkey=jokeryyy8dyroevfg7hdt3sff&dl=0
