Sarah Courtney,Minister for Resources
The Hodgman Liberal Government welcomes the approval by the George Town Council of a planning application for Patriarch & Sons’ value-adding plant for Bell Bay.
The Patriarch development, which is planned for Tasmania’s largest heavy industrial zone, would result in downstream processing of timber that would otherwise be exported as woodchips or whole logs.
The Patriarch proposal, which has received EPA approval, has the potential to create up to 110 jobs over a number of stages and will capture more value for Tasmanian grown timber from downstream processing into products such as veneers and plywood.
Contrary to assertions by Green groups, Patriarch has stated that their plans would require no new logging of public forest resources as a result of the proposal. This project will allow a greater percentage of timber already being harvested from plantation and native forest resources within the region to be converted from pulpwood into higher value products.
Any timber sourced for this mill must be harvested in accordance with Tasmania’s world-leading forest practices regulations.
