In recent times both Paper & Chipboard products have been farmed with great success, but you can’t farm timber plantations that need 40-60 years growth before the tree gets to a size suitable to mill. We can and invite you to join the program. It all starts with the Radial Timber method of milling. Our hardwood plantations can be milled from 22 years and still yield the same as a 40 year + old tree. This means we can now farm trees for timber. And we are.
Radial Timber together with Heartwood Plantations has planted up to 2,000,000 trees in Gippsland Victoria, with the first plantations going up in 2003, we plant trees that are indigenous to the Gippsland area like Yellow String Bark, Southern Mahogany, Silvertop and Spotted Gum.The forest in time becomes a hybrid landscape where our needs for timber combine with an immediate acceptance of native flaura & fauna. This is the future solution to supply timber for our communities and protect native and old growth forests. There is no other alternative except importing the timber which is the worst of all solutions
Radial timber hopes to see a specialised timber industry that produces high quality world class products, utilising the most advanced technology in a sustainable way that allows plantation and regrowth forests to be processed in an efficient manner, which will then enable old growth forests to be preservered for future generations
It is Radial timber’s plan to become self sufficient and totally sustainable by managing saw log plantations of durable hardwoods in Gippsland. It has a 20 year plan to establish up to 2000 hectares of Yellow Stringybark, Southern Mahogany, and Spotted Gum pruned and thinned plantations. To date, 700 hectares have been planted at Woodside, Alberton and Sale with the oldest trees 10 years old (planted 2003). This is a long term commitment as we expect to harvest our first logs in 2020 but it is one we are totally committed to. In the short term, we intend to seek out and utilize whatever plantation material is available and to only process logs that have been obtained from sustainably managed forests. Business have rejected our proposition because the return on investment are 20 + years minimum and many investors want a quicker return for their buck.
Historically, timber companies have sourced timber from native and crown land, or worse, imported unsustainable wood from overseas rain forests. Radial Timber & Heartwood Plantations have purchased disused land and planted native trees so that the next generation of Australians can both live in houses and enjoy our forests. Unless the developers make us all live in flats!
Australian ingenuity is turning the age-old tradition of sawmilling on its head. Radial sawing, which cuts round logs into wedges, means smaller trees can be turned into useful timber. The technology has massive implications for native forests – it means useable timber can be grown in plantations in half the time.
Source: Landline | Duration: 18min 15sec
