Jamax Forest Solutions

14/10/2026

Our State forests are about much more than timber.

This beautiful photograph from Bago State Forest in the Snowy Valleys is a reminder of the many values our publicly managed forests provide.

The award-winning image captures "Contemplation", one of the sculptures along the Alpine Ash Walk, part of a remarkable initiative helping regional communities recover from the Black Summer bushfires.

It's also a reminder that sustainable timber production, conservation, recreation, tourism and cultural experiences can coexist within our State forests.

Across Australia, multiple-use State forests provide opportunities for regional employment, renewable timber production, public access and community enjoyment.

We should be celebrating and strengthening these multiple benefits, rather than treating timber production and conservation as mutually exclusive.

Congratulations to photographer Stephen Harrison and everyone involved in the Snowy Valleys Sculpture Trail.

Well-managed forests can deliver for the environment, the economy and the community.

A photograph of a solitary figure in a Snowy Valleys forest will take Murrumbateman’s Stephen Harrison to Sydney to join…

13/10/2026

Sometimes the future of timber construction lies in rediscovering the past.

This fascinating Wood Central article examines how medieval timber joinery could influence the next generation of mass timber buildings, reducing reliance on permanent connections and making structures easier to dismantle, repair and reuse.

But these principles aren't confined to medieval buildings or university research.

Here in Australia, businesses such as Traditional Timber Frames are already demonstrating the enduring value of traditional craftsmanship, using Australian hardwoods and softwoods with mortise-and-tenon joints and timber pegs to create beautiful, durable structures.

There is an important lesson here for Australia's forest and wood products industries.

Innovation isn't always about replacing traditional knowledge. Sometimes it's about combining centuries of craftsmanship with modern engineering, precision manufacturing and sustainable forest management.

And it reminds us that timber is far more than a commodity. Its strength, versatility, natural beauty and capacity for repair and reuse make it an extraordinary renewable building material.

The opportunity is not simply to grow more timber buildings, but to build structures that can serve generations, with timber components capable of being reused for generations more.

Well worth reading, and take a look at the craftsmanship of Traditional Timber Frames.

Wood Central: https://woodcentral.com.au/medieval-timber-joinery-mass-timber/

Traditional Timber Frames: https://www.facebook.com/TraditionalTimberFrames

Madeline Adams wants computer-cut versions of medieval wooden joints in mass timber, so buildings can be dismantled and their timber used again.

06/10/2026

This is what timber substitution looks like in the real world.

The ACCC has taken action after imported Meranti was allegedly marketed for use in BAL-12.5 bushfire applications despite being insufficiently dense for some of those uses.

The regulator says builders may have inadvertently used timber that did not meet Australian building requirements. Other suppliers subsequently removed potentially misleading BAL claims from their material.

That should be a warning to governments making decisions to shut down Australia's native hardwood industry.

You cannot simply remove locally grown, fit-for-purpose hardwoods from the market and assume an imported substitute will provide the same properties.

Timber species are not interchangeable. Density, strength, durability, machining characteristics and bushfire performance all matter.

As Victoria has shut its state native forest industry, and NSW progressively removes productive forests from timber supply, Australia becomes increasingly dependent on imported products to fill the gap.

That carries consequences - for building performance, supply security, regional jobs and potentially the environmental standards applying where that timber is produced.

The ACCC case is not proof that forest closures caused this particular breach. But it is a very clear demonstration of the risks involved in assuming that imported timber is automatically an equivalent substitute for the Australian hardwoods governments are deliberately taking out of production.

Before governments close more forests, they need to answer a basic question: what exactly will replace the timber?

The ACCC alleges a Victorian importer's Meranti was not dense enough for door frames and low windows in bushfire zones, while other suppliers have pulled their bushfire claims.

06/10/2026

There is an important message in this article that is being missed in much of the Australian forestry debate.

Natural regeneration can be a very cost-effective way to restore degraded forests.

Plantations are important for producing timber.

And sustainably managed native forests can produce timber while remaining forests.

These are different land management tools serving different purposes.

The mistake is pretending plantations can simply and quickly replace the timber currently supplied from native forests.

They can’t.

Plantations require suitable land, major establishment investment and decades of growth before they produce commercial timber. Even then, they do not necessarily produce the same range of structural, appearance and high-durability products currently sourced from native forests.

At the same time, Australia is already importing a large share of the timber it consumes.

Closing productive native forests without first establishing a genuine replacement resource does not make timber demand disappear. It simply shifts production, environmental impacts and economic activity somewhere else.

Good forest policy should recognise the role of conservation, natural regeneration, plantations and sustainable native forestry across the landscape rather than pretending one model can replace all the others.

Worth a read.

Of a dozen restoration methods compared by FAO, only irrigation-led projects and silvopasture cost more per hectare than plantations.

06/10/2026

An interesting reminder that environmental management is rarely as simple as “leave every tree untouched”.

Researchers have found Murray cod numbers tripled after 4,450 large pieces of timber were returned to a 110-kilometre stretch of the Murray River. Golden perch numbers doubled.

Why?

Because large woody debris provides essential habitat - shelter, feeding areas and spawning sites. Researchers describe these snags as the riverine equivalent of reefs.

For decades, timber was removed from Australian rivers in the belief that clearing waterways was good management. We now spend public money putting large timber back because we better understand its ecological value.

There is a broader lesson here.

Good environmental management is based on understanding ecological processes, not simplistic assumptions that human intervention is inherently harmful.

Trees, timber, disturbance, regeneration and habitat all interact across landscapes. Sometimes trees need to remain standing. Sometimes timber on the ground or in waterways provides critical habitat. And sometimes active management produces better environmental outcomes than simply locking an area up and walking away.

That is why forestry and natural-resource policy should be driven by evidence, site conditions and sound science - not slogans.

A seven-year study tracked tagged fish after snags from Hume Highway clearing were returned to 110 kilometres of the Murray River.

02/10/2026

Recent News of the Area Letter to the Editor on the INFM

02/10/2026

Koala conservation is more complicated than counting trees - or counting koalas.

An interesting contribution from forester Vic Jurskis, prompted by the latest Victorian koala research.

Victoria’s statewide survey estimates about 225,000 koalas, yet researchers also found substantial chronic ill-health and acknowledged that some populations occur at unsustainably high densities.

Perhaps most revealingly, koala densities in Victorian blue-gum plantations were reported to be more than six times higher than in neighbouring native forest, with around 51,700 koalas living in the plantation estate.

That should give pause to anyone treating “undisturbed forest” as an automatic proxy for koala conservation.

The same lesson is emerging in NSW. Government research found no significant decline in male koala density three years after selective harvesting at the State forest study sites, while male koala density declined significantly in paired national-park sites affected by drought and canopy dieback. The study has limitations - particularly its focus on males - but that is precisely why the evidence should be described accurately rather than selectively.

Forests are dynamic ecosystems. Koala numbers and health respond to food quality, forest structure, drought, fire, disease, population density and land management - not simply to whether timber harvesting occurs.

Jurskis goes further in arguing for substantially more frequent mild burning. Whilst some might disagree, his broader point is difficult to dismiss:

High koala numbers do not necessarily mean a healthy koala population, and low numbers do not automatically mean poor habitat.

Good conservation policy has to start with ecology rather than slogans.

Read Vic Jurskis’ article below:

A systematic survey of high-density koalas in Victoria has found that they are generally unhealthy. Forty three per cent (29/68) of sampled koalas were euthanised ... It’s not really that complicated. Overcrowded koalas suffer malnutrition and disease because they are overcrowded. Their numbers ex...

01/10/2026

Plantations are part of Australia’s timber future. But saying they can simply replace native forestry ignores both the resource and Australia’s actual timber needs.

David Lindenmayer makes some sensible points in this article about protecting biodiversity when plantations are established and managed.

The problem is the leap from that proposition to “plantations are the future of timber.”

You will often hear that around 90% of Australia’s harvested log volume comes from plantations.

But that statistic says very little about whether plantations can meet Australia’s domestic demand for timber products.

The distinction matters enormously.

Australia’s hardwood plantation estate is overwhelmingly geared towards pulpwood, much of it for export. Venn and colleagues found that only 1.6% of hardwood plantation log volume harvested between 2002-03 and 2023-24 was used for domestic solid-wood manufacture.

At the same time, native-forest hardwood sawlog production has fallen dramatically.

Venn et al. found that Australian native hardwood sawlog production fell by around 75% - from about 4 million m³ RWE a year to 1 million m³ - while solid-wood imports increased from about 2.9 million to 6.9 million m³ RWE.

Their econometric analysis found plantation softwood and native hardwood were complementary products, not simple substitutes.

Most importantly, they estimated a long-run timber-harvest leakage rate of 81.3%: for every 1,000 m³ of native-forest production removed in Australia, about 813 m³ was replaced by additional imported solid wood.

That is the issue the “plantations will replace native forestry” argument routinely misses.

Australia can harvest large volumes of plantation logs and still become increasingly dependent on imported structural, appearance-grade and durable timber products because those plantation logs are not necessarily producing the same products Australians need.

Plantations should absolutely be expanded. They should also be designed and managed carefully for biodiversity.

But plantations and sustainably managed native forests produce different resources and perform different roles.

Closing productive native forests today on the assumption that plantations might replace their products decades from now does not remove timber demand.

It transfers much of that demand offshore.

The sensible forestry policy is not plantations OR native forests.

It is plantations AND well-regulated, sustainable native forestry - matched to the products each resource can actually produce.

As plantations supply more of Australia’s timber, how they are established and harvested will increasingly shape biodiversity. Good management can make a substantial difference.

01/10/2026

Help shape the future of NSW timber truss road bridges

Transport for NSW is reviewing the current Timber Truss Bridge Strategy, which helps guide decisions about which historic timber truss road bridges should be conserved, how they should be maintained, and how heritage values can be balanced with modern transport needs.

We are inviting community members, road users, councils, heritage organisations, and other interested stakeholders to provide early feedback before the 2027 review.

Your feedback will help us understand local priorities, community needs and the factors that should be considered as we review the strategy and prepare a draft revised strategy for further feedback in 2027.

Have your say

Your voice matters. If you have feedback on the state’s historic timber truss road bridges, we want to hear from you. Your feedback will help inform the review’s recommendations on how these bridges are conserved and maintained into the future.

Ways you can provide feedback:

Visit the project’s Have your say page to:
• Complete the survey
• Upload a submission or
• Drop a pin on our interactive map
• Send a written submission to Timber Truss Bridge Strategy review, PO Box 334, Parkes NSW 2870 or [email protected]

Feedback closes at 11:59pm on Friday 30 October 2026. Your feedback will help identify local priorities and inform the draft revised strategy, which will go on public exhibition for further feedback in 2027.

Next steps

After this first round of feedback closes, Transport will review and consider submissions from the community, councils, heritage organisations, industry groups and road users.

This feedback will help shape the draft revised Timber Truss Bridge Strategy. The draft strategy is planned to go on public exhibition in 2027, giving the community another opportunity to comment before the strategy is finalised.

We will keep communities informed as the review progresses and before any proposed changes are made to bridges currently identified for retention.

We look forward to hearing from you

Your feedback will help Transport understand what matters most to communities and road users as the strategy is reviewed.

We look forward to hearing from you and working with communities to support safe, reliable roads while respecting the heritage value of NSW timber truss road bridges.

For more information, contact us at [email protected] or call 1800 167 499.

Timber Truss Bridge Strategy review

21/09/2026

Three Aussie finalists in World Architecture festival

Three of this year’s finalists – the New Sydney Fish Market, the Adelaide Aquatic Centre and The Forest at the University of Tasmania - have been shortlisted for the World Architecture Festival, which opens in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, on 18 November. Source: Timberbiz

https://www.timberbiz.com.au/three-aussie-finalists-in-world-architecture-festival/