Today, Antarctic Toothfish plunderer, the Antarctic Aurora, docked in Hobart. This vessel, which can set up to 60,000 hooks in the pristine Southern Ocean, should not be welcome in a city that claims to be an Antarctic guardian and custodian.

“With scientists reporting an unprecedented heatwave in Antarctica just yesterday, the last thing the Antarctic ecosystem needs is its wildlife ripped out of the ocean,” said Alistair Allan, Antarctic Campaigner for Bob Brown Foundation.

“This vessel is an industrial killing machine and is anything but sustainable. The threats Antarctica faces over the next few decades will be immense. We need to give this vulnerable and unique ecosystem and its wildlife the best chance we can. A very easy way to start would be to ban vessels like the Antarctic Aurora from plundering Antarctica.”

“Antarctic toothfish are an unnecessary luxury product. In this age of climate crisis, we should not be travelling to the end of the earth to profit off the Antarctic equivalent of shark fins.”

Bob Brown Foundation is raising grave concerns about the Australian government's 'selective' sanctions after the logging industry has revealed timber importers want the Morrison government to go easy on sanctions that would affect wood imports.

“While Ukrainians are bombed, Australian merchants who import Putin’s Russian timber make a greedy, self-interested appeal to the Morrison government to avoid sanctions. Meanwhile, Australian wood is going overseas,” Bob Brown said.

“Prime Minister Morrison appears to be turning a blind eye to any resource industry exempting them from Russian sanctions. A Russian oligarch sanctioned by UK and USA is a major shareholder in Falcon Oil and Gas in the Beetaloo joint venture and Queensland Alumina is a Rusal subsidiary owned by Putin’s close associate Oleg Deripaksa yet they have not been sanctioned. Now we have the timber importers in on the act,” said Christine Milne.

“Australians care if their house is built with conflict timber from Russia and we care about urging tough sanctions on all shipping and materials from Russia,” Jenny Weber, Campaign Manager with Bob Brown Foundation said.

The Bob Brown Foundation is calling into question the sustainability of forestry company Midway, over recent logging of native forests inside plantations managed by the Forestry Corporation of NSW (FCNSW). Earlier this year Midway subsidiary Queensland Commodity Exports ceased receipt of plantation timber from New South Wales due to the risks posed to conservation values within NSW plantation areas by these activities.

Investigations undertaken by citizen scientists and stakeholders reveal that significant areas of biodiversity, including koala habitat, old growth trees, and rainforests are impacted by logging inside plantation areas, and that remnant native forests inside plantations continue to be imperilled.

“The areas are incredibly important from a biodiversity perspective, as they very often represent the last refuge for endangered species inside plantations, and they must be protected,” says Doro Babeck, Citizen Science Co-ordinator and campaigner, Bob Brown Foundation.

“We congratulate community stakeholders for their ongoing hard work. If it were not for the stakeholders and citizen-scientists, yet more forests and endangered species would be lost. It is a terrible indictment of the Forestry Corporation and the NSW Government that it takes a few brave people to do a job that the state’s regulatory bodies should have undertaken years ago.”

“This should serve as a warning to Midway that the destruction of native forest habitat will not be tolerated,” Doro continued. “It is also a lesson that must be learned by the Forest Stewardship Council and other private certification schemes.”

“Without community participation in decision-making it doesn’t matter how noble your intentions. The commitment of government agencies and forest managers to sustainability cannot be guaranteed. We will continue to support community-driven efforts to protect Australia’s threatened native forest habitat wherever it is to be found.”

Bob Brown Foundation has slammed the Morrison Government’s plans to create fast track approval zones for mining and development as fast tracking extinction for species on the brink.

“In a country with the worst record of species extinction, it is unimaginable that the Morrison Government wants to create zones where the normal environmental protections are weakened," said Bob Brown Foundation takayna / Tarkine Campaigner Scott Jordan.

“Last year the Australian Government was forced to recognise another 13 species as extinct. Who is next? The Koala, the Tasmanian Devil, the Orange-bellied Parrot?”.

“To hand over Australia’s beloved and precious species to miners and developers in a wild west style lawlessness is the opposite of what is needed to halt the extinctions."

The Samuels review of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act found that the current laws were failing to protect Australia’s threatened species and ecological communities. It recommended tougher laws and improved policing and enforcement capabilities.

“The Morrison Government sho

Activists from The Bob Brown Foundation have today immobilised all logging machinery tearing into ancient native forests in the Wentworth Hills area of Tasmania’s Central Plateau. This protest follows on from a week of protests in the same forest last month, which saw 4 protesters arrested.

"We will continue campaigning for the protection of the Wentworth Hills region for as long as it takes," said Dr Lisa Searle, campaign organiser for the Bob Brown Foundation. "Locked away from the view of the public by a network of gates, the ongoing desecration of this precious forest is rampant and must be stopped."

Today, 2 brave activists have each scaled a huge forest-destroying machine, attaching themselves to the top of logging machines to prevent logging damage happening in this forest today.

“The protesters are expected to be arrested and removed by police later today, however, there is another option for the logging machines to be removed from destroying these ancient forests,” Lisa Searle said.

"We are here today because we want to see an end to native forest logging. Sustainable Timbers Tasmania needs to move out of this area and never return. We are here to expose the ongoing loss of carbon storehouses from Tasmania's native forests, despite recent IPCC reports stating that any further delay in concerted global action on climate will miss a brief and rapidly closing window to secure a liveable future,” Dr Lisa Searle said.

"It is now very clearly documented that old forests store massive amounts of carbon from our atmosphere; carbon will not be sequestered if these forests continue to be logged and shredded for pulp and paper,” Dr Searle continued.

“The relentless logging of native forests by Tasmania’s government logging agency for low grade pulp and paper products is for products that last only days or months. Over 90% of native forest recovered from the forest coupe is destined for woodchips or export chip logs. Much of the forest crushed to the ground is left as waste on the forest floor, then incinerated, contributing to a mass amount of carbon released into the atmosphere,” said Bob Brown Foundation Campaign Manager Jenny Weber.

Premier Gutwein has his facts wildly wrong on the Wilson River Huon pine trove, Bob Brown, who pack-rafted down part of the river last month, said this afternoon.

“While there is a tiny reserve for Huon pines on Yellow Creek, an upper tributary of the Wilson River, the extensive Huon pine repository along the length of the main river and its larger tributaries, the Harman and Alfred, is unprotected as are the magnificent, ancient stands back from the Wilson River’s immediate banks.”

As the premier has been misinformed, probably because of his own woeful underfunding of the Parks and Wildlife Service. I will seek to meet him in coming days to show him exactly what is at stake and why the destructive mining operations proposed for the Wilson catchment should be abandoned while this area gets the World Heritage protection it deserves. This is a global treasure at stake and the government need to seriously get its facts right,” Brown said.

“The Wilson Arthur catchment to which the premier referred is geographical nonsense. The Wilson flows into the Pieman, not the Arthur. Its catchment is part of the Pieman River catchment. I will take along a simple map for his advisers to study,” Brown said.

Bob Brown Foundation is calling on Tasmania’s government to legislate marine protection, not fish farm expansion, as the Tasmanian upper house debates a toxic offshore salmon research bill today. If passed, the salmon industry will be able to research in Commonwealth waters with the state government as the regulator.

"We urge the members of the Tasmanian Upper House to vote down this bill," says Bec Howarth, Bob Brown Foundation's Fish Farms and Marine Campaigner.

"Tasmania’s government is pushing massive offshore fish factory expansions while seizing federal waters with minimal consultation with the Tasmanian people. Proposed new offshore technology will mean a larger scale industry, automation of jobs and all the same problems coastlines have suffered from salmon farming but on a larger scale.”

“Offshore fish factories are not the sustainable or environmental solution being touted. Current issues for Tasmanian coastal communities and our wildlife still go unsolved. It is the Tasmanian wildlife, oceans and community that will bear the burden of the environmental, lifestyle and scenic degradation that’s coming down the line.”

“It will be another loss for Tasmania's marine environment and coastal communities if the legislation passes today.

This is the UN Decade of Restoration. The global community must prioritise Ocean health and restoration over further industrialisation."

Venture Minerals has announced their third mine attack on Tasmania’s takayna / Tarkine. Rehashing a failed proposal for its Livingstone open cut iron ore mine in the rainforest clad Stanley River valley.

Threatened by this mining assault are the verified National and World Heritage Values of takayna.

“The Stanley River valley is prime hunting ground for Wedge-tailed eagle, Tasmanian devil, and Spotted tailed Quoll. It is also part of the Meredith Range Regional Reserve. An area most Tasmanians assumed was protected from the sort of destruction that Venture Minerals intends.” said Bob Brown Foundation takayna / Tarkine Campaigner Scott Jordan.

Venture Minerals first referred this mine to the Federal government in 2011, it was withdrawn last year following ten years of inactivity. The company’s only mine, the Riley Creek iron ore mine also failed last year, closing the gates just months after entering production.

“This company has spent the last ten years wreaking destruction on the wilderness of takayna with Riley creek mine and drilling at Mt Lindsay. The Tasmanian people have absolutely nothing to show for it. They have drilled and roaded away countless hectares of some of the best rainforest in the world at Mount Lindsay and the Wilson River valley, and have left a maze-like scar of roading and drill pads across the open heathlands of the Stanley River valley.”

“As she should with Mount Lindsay, Australia’s Environment Minister Sussan Ley should reject the Livingstone proposal as clearly unacceptable, and revisit the Australian Heritage Council’s recommendation to place takayna / Tarkine on the National Heritage List."

A global treasure of ancient Huon pine groves has been found in the Wilson River valley south of Waratah in the takayna / Tarkine wilderness.

Two years ago Rob Blakers, Jarrah Vercoe and Nick Fitzgerald walked and pack-rafted down the 40km long Wilson River to its junction with the now-flooded Pieman River. They found the river lined with Huon pines with intact groves of giant pines more than a thousand years old back in the rainforest. Rob has since made several return journeys and in February took scientists Charley Gros and Kasey McNamara, and Bob Brown and Paul Thomas for a three-day pack rafting trip there.

“The Wilson Valley Huon pines are a global treasure,” Brown said. “The catchment is clothed with magnificent rainforest, including these unique Tasmanian pines which live to more than 3,000 years old. It is worthy of World Heritage of itself and makes the nomination of takayna / Tarkine essential.”

“Venture Minerals’ proposed Mt Lindsay tin mine, tailings dam and crushing plant in this catchment must be scrapped. There are 300 tin mines operating or ready to go in the world and the natural integrity of the Wilson Valley must not be sacrificed just to add one more. Tin is abundant but Huon pine groves are rare and intact catchments like this were thought to no longer exist. There is the solitary, remote Olegas Truchanas Huon Pine Forest on the Denison River which was threatened by a bushfire last month, but the rest of the Denison, like the Franklin, Gordon, Davey and Huon was logged.”

Brown has written to the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition calling for them to securely protect the Tarkine and nominate for national and World Heritage status and to end Venture Minerals’ destructive mining activities. After Mt Lindsay, Venture plans a ‘Big Wilson’ tin mine right in the heart of the Huon pine province.

“The whole Wilson catchment must be protected: it is destined to be another Tasmanian icon. We would like to work with the government to plan management of this treasure so the public will be able to enjoy it too,” Brown said.

Bob Brown Foundation is taking legal action against both the state and federal governments to stop toxic waste from MMG’s Rosebery mine from being dumped across Lake Pieman into ancient takayna / Tarkine rainforest.

“We believe both governments have ignored the law in giving MMG the go-ahead for the rainforest waste dump. Our legal advice is that in granting a mine lease that the company is not entitled to, Resources Minister Guy Barnett has wrongly given MMG control of the Helilog Road into the rainforest to prevent citizens’ right to defend the forests,” BBF Campaign Manager Jenny Weber said in Hobart today.

“We also claim that federal Minister for the Environment, Sussan Ley, has wrongly overlooked the forest’s status as a feeding and breeding site for the Tasmanian Masked Owl which is vulnerable to extinction, according to her own advice. She ought to have at least observed the Precautionary Principle, as required by the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999, before agreeing to MMG’s heavy machinery invading the rainforest. MMG plans an initial 15 km of roads and 165 drill sites in the owl habitat forests. It is extraordinary that Minister Ley even turned down the mining company’s offer to protect big trees because they are potential owl nesting sites. This species is vulnerable to extinction.”

“MMG has several good options for a waste dump outside takayna but the rainforest and its wildlife have none. The planned waste dump will kill the rainforest forever.”

“Our scientists have established the forest targeted by MMG as one of the richest feeding and breeding sites for the Tasmanian Masked Owl known to exist. Both governments are needlessly sacrificing the wellbeing of this ancient rainforest, the Masked Owls and other rare and endangered species like Spotted-tailed Quolls and Tasmanian Devils, which the company agrees are in the forest. Ms Ley has been recklessly indifferent to the forest and its wildlife when she could have a win-win outcome by requiring MMG to use one of the available options for disposing of its acid wastes,” Ms Weber said.

“BBF is launching its biggest fundraising drive ever to pay for this two-pronged legal challenge, which we estimate could cost us $500,000. We are at a huge disadvantage as a community group up against the financial might of one of the biggest mining companies in the world, controlled and owned overseas by a nation-state with zero interest in Tasmania’s environment and backed by state and federal governments,” she added.