Bauxite mining enjoys total freedom from green displeasure

Even the ABC’s Four Corners has shown no interest. Normally they would find irresistible a story about destruction of Australian forests by big business, especially in an industry which is such a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions and is American-owned. Instead they are down in Tasmania fulminating against timber production and plantations.

I am not anti-mining. However as a forester I wish the alumina industry would go elsewhere. Nor am I anti-Alcoa. I have always found them to be an efficient and clever organisation, and it is a pleasure to see the professional way in which they have approached their operational and research obligations. They have poured multi-millions of dollars into the WA community over the years, including generous donations to conservation groups, cash payments to government departments, grants to sporting bodies, sponsorship of the arts, dispensing free tree seedlings to farmers and funding academics in the universities.

The uncritical and universal acceptance of bauxite mining in the jarrah forest is disappointing, but not difficult to understand. The government clearly believes that the economic returns from bauxite mining and alumina refining justify the impact on the forest and other forest uses. The broader community has no understanding of what is going on, since the media is silent, and in any case there has never been any public affection for the jarrah forest in the way there has been for the more visually attractive karri forest.

There are two possible reasons why the environmentalists have chosen not to fight bauxite mining:

1. they have been bought off; or
2. they have decided that it is a battle they cannot win.

The latter is the most likely. The alumina industry well-established and prosperous, is fully supported by government agencies, and has a superb public relations machine. The environmentalists would be done over, and they know it. It would be different if 1,000ha of native forest each year were being destroyed for cattle grazing, timber plantations, or water resource development, all of which are easy targets - any protest campaign against them would attract strong media support, especially from the ABC.

Despite environmentalist and community apathy, my personal view is that there will come a time in the not-too-distant future when West Australians realise what has gone on, and the extent and cost of the ecological damage which has occurred. Then perhaps they will look back on the government, agency and NGO-supported destruction of the jarrah forest by bauxite mining as one of the greatest conservation blunders in our history.