What will happen to the workers when logging stops?

ARCS believes there are numerous jobs potentially available with investment from the Queensland Government. Some examples follow.

Installing glider nest boxes

Australian National University, Greening Australia, and the World Wide Fund for Nature-Australia teamed up to design, test and install high-tech nest boxes for gliders. The boxes aim to keep greater gliders not too hot, not too cold, but just right by incorporating insulation, air gaps, and heat-reflective, fire-resistant, non-toxic coatings.

In February and April 2022, 120 hi-tech nest boxes were installed in fire-affected forests in Tallaganda National Park and state forest in New South Wales and a further 114 near Bendoc in East Gippsland, Victoria.

Dr Kita Ashman, Threatened Species and Climate Adaptation Ecologist, WWF-Australia was part of the team deploying cameras and looking inside the boxes for signs of occupancy. As she approached only the second nest box being checked, a greater glider poked its head out. Dr Ashman then looked into the box to find a further two greater gliders inside.

There would be many jobs installing and maintaining hundreds, possibly thousands, of nest boxes throughout intensively logged State Forests in Queensland.

Restoring intensively logged new reserves.

In the SEQ Regional Plan Area alone, there should be around 35,000 hectares of new conservation reserves by the end of 2024 as a result of the SEQ Forests Agreement. These former State Forests will have been intensively logged and will need management intervention. That will entail many jobs.