The vast majority of Australians and all mainstream nature protection groups\u2014<\/strong>including Greenpeace\u2014agree that Australia should end native forest logging, and that governments should create vast new national parks to protect and manage some of our most magnificent remaining forests. But there is significant disagreement about how this transition should come about and now a decision is coming up before the Australian Parliament.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n On 15 September the Australian Senate is due to vote on a motion about a new carbon credit method for forest protection\u2014the \u201cImproved Native Forest Management\u201d (INFM) Method. Lifelong forest protection champions and people of good will and intentions find themselves on opposing sides of this debate<\/a>. That\u2019s okay\u2013people of good faith can have legitimate differences of view, and this should be honoured in our democracy.<\/p>\n The NSW government<\/a> has promised to create the Great Koala National Park on the Mid North Coast of the state. The government has also said that the final creation of the park is dependent on the successful registration of a carbon project under the Improved Native Forest Management (INFM) Method. The creation of the park will effectively mean an end to native forest logging in the region.<\/p>\n \u00a9 Greenpeace \/ Caleb McElrea<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n Native forest logging is not something on which Greenpeace has actively campaigned on in Australia for some decades, but we are making our position clear on this issue now, because it is a matter of significant public note that falls clearly within our environmental mission remit.\u00a0<\/p>\n After careful consideration, Greenpeace believes this method should not be voted down by the Senate, and we call on Senators of all parties to vote against the disallowance motion.\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n To be abundantly clear, Greenpeace holds longstanding opposition to the carbon credit system, but in these circumstances we cannot in good conscience conflate that position with de facto opposition to the creation of massive new national parks. Although it is uncomfortable to do so, our position here is to recognise that suboptimal architecture can still be turned to good ends. We genuinely rejoice in the imminent possibility of new national parks, including the Great Koala National Park in NSW which so many community members and scientists have tenaciously argued for, over very many years, and which are so desperately needed for the forests and the wildlife which inhabits them.<\/p>\n In reaching our view, we also take strong notice of the opinion of the INFM among leading forest scientists, including leading forest ecologist Professor David Lindenmayer who supports the INFM<\/a> as do a range of other experts. We have also taken special note of the position of the peak body for nature in New South Wales, the NSW Nature Conservation Council, and of local forest activist conservation groups, who support the INFM not being voted down in the Senate.\u00a0<\/p>\n The fight to save Australia\u2019s magnificent native forests from logging has been a decades-long battle. It has reshaped both the ecological and political landscape of the nation as vast forests have been levelled or\u2013thankfully\u2013sometimes saved, and political parties and leaders have risen and fallen on the back of moves to ruin or protect them.<\/p>\n It is no surprise then that the latest chapter in Australian forest protection has become politically fraught.<\/p>\n In 2024 Western Australia and Victoria officially ended native forest logging on the back of both overwhelming public pressure to do so combined with the clearly unviable financial state of the industry. This forest protection has not been bullet proof\u2014some areas still being targeted under the guise of fire management and \u201csalvage logging\u201d<\/a>\u2013and other drivers of deforestation including for bauxite mining<\/a>\u2013remain a significant problem. Nonetheless, these announcements were still a very significant leap forward for forest conservation and to the credit of the advocates, communities, and scientists who fought for these outcomes\u2013and the governments who made the decisions.<\/p>\n But native forests continue to fall to logging in Tasmania, New South Wales and to an extent in Queensland. So the political battle has now concentrated mostly on these states, with a renewed push by communities and environment groups to finally end native forest logging once and for all, including via the creation of large new national parks for the benefit of the whole community and for nature to flourish.<\/p>\n \u00a9 Greenpeace \/ Paul Hilton<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n In New South Wales, thanks to the extraordinary effort and vision of forest advocates and ecologists, proposals have been drawn up for two large national parks to protect forests currently targeted for logging and link them up with already protected areas\u2014the Great Koala National Park<\/a> in the north and the Great Southern Forest National Park<\/a> in the south.<\/p>\n The creation of national parks requires resources. In the step up phase, the provision of public funding enables workers and communities to be supported to exit the logging industry. Significant funding is then required on a permanent basis to manage the National Parks that are created, including crucially to carefully manage fire to support forest health and regeneration, particularly as global warming continues to raise the risk of repeated catastrophic bushfires.<\/p>\n Along with many others, Greenpeace has a long held and strong view that nature should be protected for its own sake (rather than having to justify a monetary benefit) and that this funding should be provided by governments as a public good. Many forests and extraordinary places across Australia have been protected on this very basis for decades. Public funds for the shared good of nature protection for all Australians. Yet it is also the case that far too little public money is spent on taking care of nature.\u00a0<\/p>\n Australians are not only justifiably proud of and love our natural heritage\u2013our iconic wildlife and fantastic wild places\u2013we also depend on the web of life for our own flourishing. And yet significantly less than 1% of all public money in Australia is spent on taking care of nature across our magnificent continent. It is inadequate to do what is needed in the face of the extinction crisis and the severe climate damage caused by global warming.<\/p>\n So, it is on the question of sources of revenue where fierce disagreement has emerged amongst forest champions. As noted above, the position taken by the New South Wales Government is that the creation of the Great Koala National Park hinges on raising the necessary funds by selling carbon credits to companies as an offset to the greenhouse gas emissions they are producing (recognising the value of carbon stored in forests). For this reason, whether the Great Southern National Park proposal progresses or not is also likely to depend on the ability to create carbon credits from it.\u00a0<\/p>\n Some advocates are understandably steadfastly opposed and outraged that the creation of a National Park would rely on carbon credits to be established, while others see this a reluctantly pragmatic yet effective pathway to a rapid end to native forest logging, not just in New South Wales but also in Tasmania and elsewhere. People of good will can disagree\u2013and on this, they do.<\/p>\n We also recognise that it is a difficult debate to have in the public realm\u2013because those not across the debates over policy and principle will be fairly inclined to bewilderment that anyone who cares about nature could possibly oppose the creation of new national parks on what might seem like quite arcane grounds.<\/p>\n \u00a9 Lachlan L. Hall \/ Greenpeace<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n Like forest protection, curbing Australia\u2019s climate pollution has been another politically vexed problem for decades. Climate policies have come and gone, taking political leaders with them.<\/p>\n In 2011 the Carbon Farming Initiative was established by the Gillard Labor government and supported by the Greens (then led by Bob Brown and Christine Milne). This set up a system whereby farmers and Indigenous communities could generate carbon credits to better manage forests (including with better fire management) to receive funding from the Federal Government or corporations as a means of storing or reducing carbon emissions on the land, while also (ostensibly) protecting nature and creating regional jobs.\u00a0<\/p>\n This scheme then morphed into the Abbott Coalition government\u2019s Emissions Reduction Fund and Safeguard Mechanism in 2014. This policy was cynical in nature, designed to do virtually nothing given Tony Abbott\u2019s aggressive rejection of the need for greenhouse gas emission reduction, essentially expanding a voluntary market where carbon polluters could buy carbon credits to offset their emissions. There was very little obligation for polluters to actually reduce emissions at site or be forced to buy carbon credits at all.<\/p>\n Then, in 2023 the Albanese government reformed the Safeguard Mechanism, setting stricter emission baselines for polluters and forcing many to buy carbon credits to offset their emissions.<\/p>\n The problem is this latest reform of the Safeguard Mechanism has not worked<\/a>. This is partly due to the emission baselines being set too low but also because many polluters have simply been buying up carbon credits rather than attempting to actually reduce their emissions.<\/p>\n Furthermore, the very concept of carbon credits is highly problematic. Unlike fossil fuels<\/a> found in their natural state, carbon and greenhouse gases stored in forests and the land are more volatile and exposed to rapidly being released to the atmosphere from fires, disease, floods and other natural or global heating-driven events. Greenpeace holds a longstanding position of deep scepticism about the efficacy of carbon credits. That has not changed.<\/p>\n In practice most of the existing carbon credit methods have been under sustained criticism<\/a> from experts and scientists with deep knowledge of the system, arguing that currently, most projects are receiving credits for little or no actual storing of carbon in the land.\u00a0<\/p>\n So when advocates for forest protection and climate action raise concerns about protecting forests via carbon credits, it\u2019s clear why.<\/p>\n \u00a9 Lachlan L. Hall \/ Greenpeace<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n Chief public critic and whistleblower<\/a> of the historic carbon credit system in Australia, Professor Andrew Macintosh, has been the lead architect behind the creation of the Improved Native Forest Management\u00a0(INFM) which has been developed in partnership with the New South Wales Government. This is because despite having been a critic of the carbon credit system as it was operating, Professor Macintosh is not against carbon credits per se, but rather a poorly designed and executed system.<\/p>\n Regardless of what one thinks of the morality or efficacy of the method; the fiscal truth is that the INFM would create a new means for state governments to generate significant revenue by ending native forest logging in key areas and protecting and managing the forests.\u00a0<\/p>\n Professor Macintosh and other supporters of the method argue that<\/a> unlike other carbon credit methods, the INFM is of the highest integrity possible. That\u2019s because the carbon that is credited is conservative, accounting for approximately 1\/10th of potential carbon stored, a regional cap prevents logging simply commencing elsewhere, and significant financial penalties apply for non delivery of credits. If all the forests threatened by logging were protected by this method that would represent about 5% of carbon credits in the system<\/a>. Significantly, the New South Wales Government has also pledged that no carbon credits from the Great Koala National Park would be sold to fossil fuel companies<\/a>.<\/p>\n Leading ecologist and staunch forest advocate Professor David Lindenmayer also supports the method<\/a>. Other prominent ecologists also provided input into the method.<\/p>\n Key environmental groups in New South Wales such as the North East Forest Alliance and South East Forest Alliance as well as the Nature Conservation Council of NSW (which is the peak body for nature in NSW) strongly support the INFM<\/a> and see it as key to creating large forest National Parks in the state and effectively ending native forest logging.<\/p>\n![\"Koala](\"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org.au\/static\/planet4-australiapacific-stateless\/2025\/01\/0071288e-gp0su1syl-1024x683.jpg\" "\\"Koala")
The politically fraught nature of forest protection<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org.au\/static\/planet4-australiapacific-stateless\/2025\/10\/e9cef5cf-gp0su1guc_pressmedia-2500px-1024x575.jpg\" "\\"Native")
Protection with or without carbon markets?<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org.au\/static\/planet4-australiapacific-stateless\/2026\/05\/06362aa1-gp0su1b5y_pressmedia-2500px-1024x683.jpg\" "\\"Red")
Australia\u2019s troubled and troubling carbon market<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org.au\/static\/planet4-australiapacific-stateless\/2026\/05\/e959af28-gp0su1b5v_pressmedia-2500px-1024x730.jpg\" "\\"Spotted-tail")
The INFM method<\/h2>\n
![\"Lush](\"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org.au\/static\/planet4-australiapacific-stateless\/2026\/04\/0aa3eb2a-gp04ixm-1024x683.jpg\" "\\"Rainforest")