Having outlined the major historical antecedents and the emerging political context to the case study in Chapter Five, attention is now turned to what was to constitute and cause the forests of East Gippsland to become politically `problematic'. The chronology covered is the period from 1968, when a Japanese-owned export woodchip scheme was approved for the forests of south-east NSW, up until the election in April 1982 of the Cain Labor government in Victoria.

This chapter's focus is on the specifics of the issues, discourses and rival forces which shaped conflict over East Gippsland's native forests. Central here will be the questions of woodchipping, National parks and sustainability of wood production. Accounts of these questions form the basis of this chapter. The objective is to trace the formation of rival discourses over the forests and how they shaped a developing political controversy. I will examine the making of what Foucault would call a `discursive formation'. I will also examine how this particular conflictual formation became a `problematic of government'. Particular attention will be placed on the major forces which became party to this conflict, how their positions were deployed in the construction of public discourses, their tactical strategies, and the mechanisms of government in which the conflict was fought out and governmental programmes for the forests were devised.

The chapter is organised in five sections: first, the early politics associated with prospects of developing a woodchip operation in East Gippsland and the inter-corporate conflict over its control are documented; second, the newly constituted Lands Conservation Council's (LLC) review of land-use in East Gippsland and the rival discourses on new National parks are reviewed; third, the manner in which the Forest Commission made its estimates of wood resources and their impact on long-term sustainability is considered; fourth, the actions of the Forest Commission in starting woodchipping operations and the Government's direction for an enviromental effects statement into pulpwood harvesting are discussed; and finally, the nature of the widening `Green' campaign over the fate of East Gippsland's forests, leading up to the Victorian State elections in 1982 is outlined.

Prospects of Japanese markets for Australian pulpwood in the form of exported woodchips were linked in the late 1960s by Government forest services to their more traditional discourse on an `integrated operation' for wood production from native forests. An integrated operation involves the simultaneous harvesting of sawlogs and pulpwood from the same logging site. Within this discourse, it is argued that markets for woodchips, which are produced from low-grade timber below sawlog standard (called pulpwood) and which is initially processed into standard woodchips, allow the reduction of waste that would remain in logging areas and enable "...the effective regeneration of areas currently carrying poor-quality, decadent forest" (Wood and Kirkpatrick 1984:229). Linked to this discourse is the argument that woodchip markets also provide a means to utilize considerable volumes of wood residues generated in sawmilling processing.

In Victoria, integrated operations were first introduced when in 1939 Australian Paper Manufacturers Ltd (APM) opened its pulp and paper mill complex at Maryvale in the La Trobe Valley. Under the initial terms of the wood supply arrangements between the Government and APM, a legislated agreement to a pulpwood supply concession lasting fifty years and consisting of about 200,000 hectares of public forest was granted. The terms and conditions of the original 1936 APM concession were altered in subsequent amendments to the original Act in 1961, 1966 and 1974. Such amendments provided increases in both the supply area and volume of wood in line with additions to APM's processing capacity at Maryvale. From these legislated concession areas, APM was to be supplied with pulpwood logs produced in conjunction with sawlogs for sawmills. Agreements similiar to the APM concession arrangements, but much smaller in volume terms, were also legislated for Victorian companies using pulpwood to produce hardboard products in Eildon (1956) and Bacchus Marsh (1959).

The Forest Commission's stated public policy position on integrated sawlog - pulpwood operations gave primacy to the extraction of sawlogs. Under this policy, pulpwood was to be "...secondary to the utilisation of the more valuable types of produce such as logs for sawn timber, poles and piles" (Carron 1985:195). This policy goal is important in that it remained central to the stated policy of subsequent Victorian Liberal and Labor Governments and was later to form the focus of a `sawlog-driven' management discourse for native forests. In this discourse, pulpwood harvesting would be depicted as `waste utilisation' and was used to legitimise plans to implement woodchip schemes in various parts of Victoria and particularly in East Gippsland. Disputes over the actual realities of the primacy of sawlog production were later to play a key role with environmentalists challenging integrated sawlog-pulpwood production, or as they publicily named them `woodchipping schemes'. I will return to this element of the conflict later.

The availability of Japanese markets for woodchips led, in the late 1960s, to the establishment of the first five export operations in Australia. Three operations were located in Tasmania, one in the south-west of Western Australia and the other in south-east New South Wales. The latter scheme, owned by Harris Daishowa (Australia) is of strategic importance to the East Gippsland conflict, and will be the subject of some initial discussion here.

In 1968, the NSW Forestry Commission granted a twenty year pulpwood licence to a company called Harris-Daishowa (Australia) P/L. (HDA). HDA was unlike the other initial woodchip operations owned by Australian companies with long-term supply contracts with Japanese buyers. From its outset HDA was partly owned and totally controlled by Japanese corporations. In fact, the Australian joint owner, Harris Holdings, acted more as the nominal front in early governmental negotiations, holding 51% of the shares. Its Japanese partner, Daishowa Paper Manufacturing Co, owned 49%. By 1971, after State and Commonwealth licences were in place, the plant constructed and production and export of woodchips begun, HDA was totally Japanese-owned. Daishowa (Japan) held 62.5% of shares, while 37.5% was taken by C.Itoh and Co Ltd (a large Japanese trading company) (Gilley 1982:8). HDA's licence provided for 450,000 tonnes of pulpwood per year which was to come from 320,000 hectares of State forests in the south-east corner of the State. This annual volume soon increased to 510,000 tonnes, while HDA's Commonwealth export licence allowed for the annual export of 610,000 tonnes. An additional licence was granted for 150,000 tonnes to come from sawmill residues. HDA was also obtaining a substantial volume of pulpwood from privately-owned forests in NSW and East Gippsland.

As a resource regime, the arrangements between the NSW Forestry Commisssion and HDA conformed to the type of concession systems which previously had been granted to supply Australian pulp and paper mills. They were long-term concession arrangements (20 years) and provided defined area rights to State forests. As Kellow (1987:265) has argued, the small amount of capital involved in setting up export woodchip mills relative to developing pulp and paper mills did not warrant the granting of long-term concession arrangements. However, under Commonwealth export licence conditions (initially for 5 years), HDA was required to install in Australia prior to 1977 a pulpmill with a minimum capacity of 510 tonnes per day of wood pulp "...or else keep the Australian Government fully informed of its plans relating to the pulpmill" (Economic and Environmental Aspects of the Export Woodchip Industry 1975:50).

No such pulpmill was ever built by HDA in Australia (investment in pulpmill facilities was undertaken in Japan). In fact, with some minor exceptions, there has been little capital expenditure on any new domestic pulp and paper capacity since the 1970s. HDA, among other large wood corporate groups, have retained within their corporate prospectus the intention to invest in pulp and paper mill development in Australia. When proposals have been publicly investigated and promoted they have always carried the political rider that such proposals would be undertaken when the market and resource conditions were commercially favourable. As will be demonstrated, these `political intentions' constitute one part of a `wood resource politics' which has often been played by large corporate groups holding stakes in Australia's native forest pulpwood resources.

HDA's woodchip conversion plant and loading facility was sited on Twofold Bay, near Eden in NSW. This had strategic implications for East Gippsland, being within economic haulage range of the East Gippsland forests and sawmills. The pending arrival of HDA and the interest of other Japanese companies purchasing Australian woodchips lead the Victorian Forest Commission to conduct resource surveys to determine the extent of pulpwood available in East Gippsland. In early 1969, the Commission advertised for expressions of interest for the pulpwood rights from forests east of the Snowy River. At this time the Forest Commission's proposal did not "...attract any comment or adverse reaction on environmental grounds" (Carron 1985:196). Formal applications were tendered by APM Ltd, HDA and Duncan Holdings (a NSW sawmill company based at Eden). However, none of these applications were regarded as firm enough to be accepted by the Forest Commission at this time (Granter 1979).

During 1969, East Gippsland sawmilling companies influenced by the prospect of Japanese woodchip markets, in particular the planned operation of HDA in the adjoining forests of NSW, began moves which quickly lead to the majority of them establishing Gippsland Paper Pulp P/L (GPP 1974). This company was intended to situate the sawmills for involvement in the region's pulpwood resource. Of the 25 local mills, 18 took up shares in GPP, based on their respective log intake volumes which on a combined basis amounted to 360,000 m3 (GPP 1975:23). GPP's stated aims were to produce woodchips from sawmill residues and to establish a forest based pulpwood harvesting operation in conjunction with the existing harvesting of sawlogs (an integrated operation). The immediate intention was that the pulpwood would be converted into woodchips for export. However, GPP stated that its long-term proposal was the development of a local East Gippsland pulp mill which would use this resource and discontinue its export.

GPP's first move was to enter negotiations with HDA for a supply contract for woodchips produced from its members' sawmill residues. Such a contract was in place by early 1972, and this immediately lead GPP's members to install small chip machines in their sawmills. Supply of woodchips from GPP began in January 1973 under an initial five years contract, for 80,000 to 120,000 tonnes per annum. The start-up of this contract for woodchips from sawmill waste provided the first opportunity to use the considerable volume of residue created as a by-product in the production of sawn timber products. This meant discontinuing the practice of burning such waste in sawmill incinerators. The practice of converting sawmill waste to woodchips was not the major subject of subsequent environmentalist challenge. Rather, it was proposals to harvest the pulpwood of the region for export woodchips or as raw material for a local pulp and paper mill development that was to became problematic.

It is the conflict over the potential commercial rights to the East Gippsland pulpwood resource developed in the period 1973-1974 which needs to be addressed. This conflict essentially features two interrelated players and exercises of power over the East Gippsland pulpwood resource. An inter-corporate conflict over who might win commercial control of the resource and a discursive strategy by an environment movement organisation designed to force a blockage preventing the Government from proceeding with any commercial developments of the resource.

From its inception, HDA expressed its commercial intentions for the East Gippsland pulpwood resource. It had first applied for rights in 1969 and maintained ongoing contact with the Victorian Forestry Commission. In mid-1973 HDA again made formal application to the Commission for a licence to produce 50,000 to 60,000 tonnes per year of pulpwood from East Gippsland (Forest Commission 1973). Its intention was to convert the resource to woodchips at its plant at Twofold Bay in NSW. While seeking these resource rights, HDA did not at that time make formal application for a Commonwealth export licence, preferring to wait for the outcome of negotiations in Victoria. HDA, at the time of its application had publicly stated its intention to increase export volumes to 915,000 tonnes per annum (Economic and Environmental Aspects of the Export Woodchip Industry 1975:34).

In response to HDA's application, the Forest Commission decided to supply HDA's request, but not in the form of a direct licence which would have given HDA direct access to the East Gippsland resource. The alternative proposal was to grant licences to several East Gippsland sawmills, enabling them to produce the pulpwood in conjunction with their existing sawlog harvesting operations and then supply the pulpwood to HDA for conversion at its woodchip plant. No final decision on these proposals was made, and on 27 November 1973 GPP, who by now had established its presence, made formal application to the Forest Commission for the exclusive rights to the East Gippsland pulpwood resource (GPP 1974). This application stated that GPP intended to supplement the Forest Commission's estimated 750,000 tonnes with 50,000 tonnes from private property and 130,000 tonnes of woodchips from sawmill residues. Representatives from GPP met with the Premier and Minister for Forests to outline their pulpmill proposal (GPP 1974). Part of GPP's plan was to conduct an export woodchip operation until such time as its proposed pulpmill was in place (GPP 1974). In response to GPP's application, in mid February 1974 the Forest Commission indicated that further investigation of the volume of pulpwood available in East Gippsland was required (Lenne 1974).

In considering APM's position regarding the East Gippsland pulpwood resource at this time, it is important to note the competitive situation that had emerged since 1968. This now involved a real market for the pulpwood of East Gippsland, offered by HDA. GPP had been created from sawmills already located within East Gippsland and had formed a commercial relationship with HDA for sawmill residue woodchips. APM had a substantial pulp and paper complex in the La Trobe Valley to the west of East Gippsland. In 1961, via amendments to its concession arrangements, APM secured pulpwood rights in some parts of the forests adjoining East Gippsland which it only partially used. Yet it had sought to extend these rights to cover the majority of the available East Gippsland pulpwood resource in its application when the Forest Commission first advertised in 1969.

Developments since 1968 presented APM with a strategic problem. It was concerned about the newly formed LCC's pending land-use review of East Gippsland and its potential for making determinations which could effect the transfer of forests from commercial wood production to national park status. It also needed to prevent any potential for competition from a new pulp and paper mill that might eventuate in East Gippsland. Owning two sawmills in East Gippsland, APM had become an initial member of GPP, with a director on their board. As a consequence, APM was aware of GPP's proposals and the progress they were making in representations to the Government. APM believed an answer lay in its political ability to renegotiate its supply and area concession arrangements under the Forests (Wood Pulp Agreement) Act. After discussions with the Forest Commission, a new Forests (Wood Pulp Agreement) Bill was introduced into Parliament in March 1974. This bill proposed a large increase in both the supply volume and the concession area available to APM. The guaranteed `Minimum Annual Supply' (MAS) of pulpwood was to be increased from 453,000 m3 to 765,000 m3 and the new concession areas included additional forests, both adjoining East Gippsland and an extensive part of East Gippsland known as the `Eastern Extension'.

It is apparent that APM's existing processing capacity at Maryvale could not use the additional wood from the extended concession areas proposed in the Bill. It has been suggested that part of APM's ploy was to agree to pay penalty royalties on any wood volume it did not use (Penna 1986:14). This was the price APM was willing to pay in order to maintain pressure on the Government and the LCC to retain large areas of forest for wood production and to prevent GPP or another pulp and paper group from gaining access to the bulk of the East Gippsland pulpwood resource (Penna 1986:15).

With the introduction of the proposed Bill, GPP removed APM's director from its board (Hansard, Leg Assembly, 1974:4955, Penna 1986:15), and with the active support of the member for East Gippsland Bruce Evans MLC, they intensively lobbied the Government to defend their position (see Hansard, Leg Assembly, 1974:4934-5019). This involved the demand that the Government reject APM's bid for the proposed `Eastern Extension'.

This proposal for a massive area concession was also of concern to environmentalists. The Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) had meet with the Premier during December 1973. The ACF proposed that none of the current proposals for the use of East Gippsland's pulpwood or concession rights to the resource should be considered by Government prior to the LCC's forthcoming land review of the area. In late December 1973, the ACF received a letter from the Secretary of the Premier's Department giving an assurance that the Premier argued with this position. This assurance was raised to embarrass the Government during debate on the proposed `Eastern Extension' for APM (Hansard, Leg Assembly, 1974:4948).

Faced with substantial opposition to the Bill, especially the proposed `East Extension', and sensitive about its environmental planning disaster in the Little Desert case by the Bill's second reading speech, the `Eastern Extension' was dropped by the Government (Hansard 30 April 1974). APM's bid for exclusive pulpwood rights east of the Snowy River in East Gippsland had been denied.

The Government had effectively placed an embargo on the development of the East Gippsland pulpwood resource pending the LCC review which was by now scheduled to commence in mid-1974. Further, in June 1974 the Forest Commission advised industry that its 1969 estimate of 750,000 had been revised down to 600,000 tonnes of pulpwood per annum in East Gippsland. It also advised that any large-scale pulpwood harvesting operation would require an Environmental Impact Statement prior to Government approval (Lenne 1974). Later, Premier Hamer gave the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) assurance that there would be a Government embargo on any pulpwood licences until the LCC review was completed (Hamer 24 December 1974, Hamer May 1975).

It is important to stress that this conflict was as much a strategic contest between rival industry groups as it was between the wood industry and environmentalists. It forms part of, and was the first round, in a `wood resource politics' over the potential woodchip resource played by corporate groups in East Gippsland. In the remaining chapters I will follow particular `resource politics' which was to be played in East Gippsland, not only by HDA but also by Australian Paper Manufactures P/L, North Broken Hill Ltd, and Andrews Sawmills P/L.

With the East Gippsland pulpwood embargo in place by the time of the LCC land-use review in mid 1974, the resource situation which had developed in the region is shown in Map 6.1. The map illustrates the Forest Commission's uncommitted pulpwood resource area known as the `Eastern Division' and the surrounding pulpwood concessions held by APM and HDA. This was a significant part of the context in which the LCC's land-use review of East Gippsland was to be undertaken. In the next section the LCC's review and the contending discourses on land-use will be considered.

As previously mentioned, the LCC represents a classic discursive design of government. The LCC's formal review of land-use in East Gippsland was conducted between June 1974 and March 1977. Procedurally, the review process commenced with the public release of a descriptive report on the study area and a call for public submissions. This was followed by the release of proposed recommendations and further public submissions, and was concluded by the submission to Government of final recommendations and their public release.

The LCC commenced its East Gippsland land-use review in the immediate wake of the intense fight amongst various forces over the concession rights to East Gippsland's considerable volume of pulpwood and the real possibility that an export woodchip operation could have been given the go-ahead. In this context the LCC land review quickly became a public arena for counter demands and rival discourses over public land-use. As a discursive design the LCC, provided the mechanism for government in which the contested issues and contesting forces could be reigned in and contained. It also provided the focus for the contesting forces to refine and deploy their various discursive positions, thus developing and giving further substance to the discursive formation which was increasingly subjecting forests to deliberation and decision.

A reading of the positional discourses deployed during the LCC's review indicates a central point of division within the discursive formation that developed. The major environment movement organisations (the ACF, Conservation Council of Victoria, Victorian National Parks Association) along with Government agencies supportive of the environment movement such as the National Museum of Victoria, demanded that the prime management goal for the forests should be `nature' preservation. This ambit claim and the associated demand that native forests be de-industrialised reflected the anti-industrialism basis of the modern environment movement. These demands and their justificatory discourses are post-distributional (in the conventional sense) reflecting the agenda of the `new class' and their supporters in urban middle class electorates. The ACF lodged claims before the LCC, which if successful would have placed 55 % of the public land in East Gippsland into permanent preservation classification (Scott 1976:22). If suceessful this level of claim would cause dramatic cut-backs in the size or the duration of the timber industry.

These demands represented a dramatically different position on the forests from that held by professional foresters, the timber industry, and timber workers. Despite the conflicts within the industry over the rights to forest resources, the timber industry and the forestry profession presented a united front in their demands for continued access to, and further development of, the East Gippsland forest resource. The industry position on new national parks and special conservation status in the forests is revealed in the submission from GPP:

On its park proposals, the LCC was criticised by the Forest Commission for its "Failure to recognise the vital role of the East Gippsland study area in meeting the long term timber requirements of the State" (FCV 1976):

The counter-position is represented in the ACF's submission:

The submission from the National Museum of Victoria in October 1974 is significant for its language. For its time it contains a fairly complete example of the emerging environmental discourse on native forests. The Museum first raises the issue of the incompatability of timber production with the "...potential of a forest for nature conservation, wilderness recreation, and aesthetic enjoyment" (National Museum of Victoria 1974:3). It called for increased scientific research into the region's environmental values. It uses the phrase `relatively pristine' to describe East Gippsland. State intervention is called for, evidenced in the following argument from the Museum:

In terms of alternative economic development prospects, the Museum put forward the case of the tourist potential of the region's forests. This discourse on tourism is linked to the environmental features and significant values of the regions forests it is argued could be enhanced by the exclusion of timber production. This is important, because this tourism based discourse was to later become a major political argument not only in the ongoing East Gippsland conflict but in natural area land-use disputes throughout the country. Tourism was promoted by environmentalists because it was not an extraction industry, it had relatively minimal ecological side effects. It was claimed that tourism could provide alternative jobs for timber workers as the industry is removed from native forests.

As would be expected, a large number of submissions dealt with the question of pulpwood harvesting. The industry argued the positive case and centred their core discourse around the regional socio-economic and ecological benefits. In particular, GPP put before the LCC its pulpmill proposal (GPP 1974), while APM argued that the East Gippsland wood resource was vital to its long term expansion plans at Maryvale (APM 1974). Professional foresters couched their position within their traditional multiple-use discourse and emphasised the `waste' argument:

Environment movement organisations argued strongly against any form of pulpwood harvesting or what they called `woodchipping'. The ACF challenged the `waste' argument, suggesting "...that it is ecologically incorrect to regard the material left in the forest after logging operations as `waste'. Such a view is strictly that of the woodchip industry" (ACF 1976:8). The ACF argued that the so-called `waste' in fact represented important fauna habitat. Other arguments against pulpwood harvesting included: its alleged increased impact on soil erosion and nutrient removal; its tendency to lead to forest management of short harvesting rotations and single species forest crops; and the associated introduction of chemical fertilisers.

Submissions from the ACF and the Conservation Council of Victoria (CCV) critically discussed the link between pulpwood harvesting and the prospect of the development of an East Gippsland pulpmill. Arguments against the pulpmill included air and water pollution problems and the necessity for a dam on the Snowy River. The case for increased local employment was also rejected, the argument being that jobs would simply be transfered from sawmilling to the pulpmill. This argument was that sawlogs would be diverted to a pulpmill, and the scale of investment would lead to the demise of the local sawmilling industry in the competition for the resource. It was also argued that the long-term investment and the scale required by a pulpmill development would compromise the future of the forests for additional conservation declarations, as well as their tourist potential.

In its proposed recommendations, released for public discussion in February 1976, the LCC proposed that 13% of the standing timber volume would be removed from logging and be included in conservation reserves. This included 10% in national parks and 3% in `uncommitted' areas pending further investigations. These recommendations also included the following statement on pulpwood harvesting, a statement which was to be repeated in its final recommendations:

Despite the recommendation for timber withdrawals being required for the establishment of parks, the LCC suggested that it had "...maintained the option to establish an economically viable pulpwood industry" (LCC 1977:8). Environmental groups argued that the LCC's park proposals were limited and could not meet the aim of preserving a full representation of the biological features contained in the East Gippsland forests. The LCC's `failure' on parks and its statements on the future possibility of a pulpwood industry lead the ACF to accuse the LCC of "...an exploitation-oriented priority towards hardwood production at the expense of the establishment of parks" (ACF 1976:2). To counter the LCC's recommendations the CCV released in April 1976 a substantial publication prepared by Ian Penna titled Woodchip Industry for East Gippsland (1986). This publication attempted to implicate the LCC in moves to establish an export woodchip operation in East Gippsland. In August 1976, a number of groups concerned with the issues in East Gippsland, including the ACF, CCV, and the Victorian National Parks Association, formed the Native Forest Action Council (NFAC) to act as a central vehicle for the fight over the future of native forests.

In response to the proposed recommendations, the timber industry concentrated on the themes of loss of regional employment and loss of economic benefits resulting from the withdrawal of timber. The Victorian Sawmillers Association (VSA), in representations to S. Dimmick (the Chairman of the LCC) claimed that the park proposals would lead to a potential employment loss of some 240 jobs and $295 million in revenue over a 20 year period (Dimmick Nov 1976). The VSA also took up specific issues concerning LCC proposals for park, wilderness and `uncommitted' areas in the north-west of the review area. Sawmillers operatng in this area had wanted these forest areas opened for logging for some time. Their preservation, the VSA argued would cause the demise of sawmills located at Buchan and Bruthen. The VSA took its concerns directly to the Minister for Conservation who was responsible for the LCC. Pressure from the VSA lead the LCC to conduct urgent studies to identify alternative supply for these mills. Based on Forest Commission data, it identified uncommitted timber reserves in the Rodger River area. What is important here is that the uncommitted Rodger River forests were part of the area previously protected from the timber industry by the Griffin line (discussed in the previous chapter). In its final recommendations the LCC withdrew its earlier proposal for the Gelantipy Plateau from `wilderness status' to `uncommitted'. The LCC argued that this reversal was a safeguard for the timber industry in case timber was needed in the future. In the words of the Chair of the LCC, this action was about placing timber resources in `cold storage' (Dimmick 27 April 1977).

The extent of industry pressure on the LCC is revealed in the following statement from a letter from the Chair(man) of the LCC to the Minister for Conservation:

The LCC, while not making a recommendation either way on pulpwood harvesting, had earlier indicated that if such a proposal was introduced, the timber resources withdrawn by its parks recommendations could in fact be made up for and increased (Dimmick 22 Novemeber 1976:3).

The LCC released its final recommendations in March 1977. The recommendations represented the first official discourse on the use of the forests of East Gippsland. The recommendations provided for new parks and conservation reserves totalling 141,000 hectares and not the 166,000 hectares involved in its proposed recommendations. This brought to about 20 %, public land under some form of preservation classification. This was far below the 55 % claimed by the ACF. In order to meet the LCC's final preservation recommendations, timber amounting to 9% of the estimated availability (not the 13% the LCC originally proposed) was to be withdrawn from the industry. This was further evidence to environmentalists that the LCC was pro-industry.

The LCC's only rider to its virtual `non-position' on pulpwood harvesting as a legitimate land-use, was to recommend that an Environmental Effects Statement be produced prior to any final decision being taken on full-scale proposals (this was not to apply for experimental pulpwood harvesting). This recommendation provided another discursive strategy where environmentalists could delay and attack any possible decision on what they now publicly called `woodchipping'. However, the LCC's stance or that lack of it was critically seen by environmental activities as tacit support for pulpwood harvesting and woodchipping (Parlane and Day 1981-82, Scott 1976).

In its `official discourse' the LCC made reference to the economic benefits from the creation of new National parks and indicated the need for further ecological assessment of East Gippsland. But more critical for ongoing conflict was that its `official discourse' created the political circumstances (a critical discursive event) for pulpwood harvesting and woodchipping to be introduced into East Gippsland. It is important to note that neither the LCC's discourse, nor the contending discourses deployed within its review process, contained any critical examination of the sustainability of the local timber industry, or the question of how critical the introduction of pulpwood harvesting was to its long-term survival.

The Government was not to formally accept the LCC's East Gippsland National parks recommendations until early 1979; after which the Forest Commission recommenced its efforts to introduce pulpwood harvesting and thus sparked once again a period of conflict. Before examining these coming events it is important to look at just how important pulpwood harvesting was to the future of the industry. The next section deals with this question by outlining the policies and operating procedures for wood production in East Gippsland and how they affected the sustainability of a timber industry. This will involve examining the methods and assumptions which formed the basis of the estimation of the wood resources available to industry.

The meaning of `sustainability' for wood production companies and government foresters does not necessarily equate with `sustainability' from the perspective of environmentalists, nor from the positions of other social groups. Considered here is the connection between sustainability and wood production, in particular the politics of wood resource estimation in East Gippsland.

For the Forest Commission and the timber industry, one critical effect of the LCC recommendations was to provide a marginally-reduced land-base where wood production forestry could continue. The Forest Commission's approach was to continue its multiple-use management approach, where wood production was the primary goal in these defined production forests. The LCC was aware that the long-term policy of the Forest Commission was to cut these forests above a sustained-yield annual volume. The LCC's position on this policy and its effect on land-use was one of `neutrality' as is evident in an LCC internal file note made just after its final recommendations on East Gippsland:

The LCC was referring to that set of policies which had been driving Victorian hardwood production forestry (see Chapter Five). In the East Gippsland case, the critical policy of the Forest Commission had been to overcut the region's forests until the Central Highlands regrowth reached optimum commercial maturity and was capable of supporting an industry relocation. The Forest Commission's strategy after taking account of the loss of timber resources resulting from the LCC's 1977 park recommendations, continued the overcut. At this time in a internal memorandum, the LCC, had estimated, using Forest Commission resource data, this overcutting could be maintained for another 25 years. After such time, the Commission planned a cut-back of 40% and a reduced East Gippsland industry until around 2035, when regrowth would be available for a second rotation (LCC August 1978).

Critical to both formulating such strategies and the prospects of delivering them, were the resource estimates developed by the Forest Commission. Resource estimation used in forestry is both highly technical and subject to uncontrollable measures of error. These influences are not discussed here. What is of interest are particular wood production practices which formed the assumptions used in forecasting the East Gippsland resource and their application in large time planning horizons. It is these production practices and the related question of pulpwood and their influence on the estimation of resource availability, and hence the sustainability of a timber industry, that were to become highly political as the conflict developed.

In the period immediately after the LCC's final recommendations in 1977, the Forest Commisssion, when making its estimations and applying them to its long term strategic planning of wood production, used figures covering the known total sawlog volume in the designated wood production forests of East Gippsland as recommended by the LCC (LCC June 1978, August 1978). However, what was generally unstated at the time was that existing sawlog-only production was operating on the basis of a convention established between the industry and the Forest Commission. Under this convention only forests which contained more than 40m3 of sawlogs per hectare were regarded as economical to harvest on a sawlog-only basis. Consequently, the volume of sawlogs available in forests which were below this definition were regarded as unrecoverable based on a sawlog-only harvesting regime.

It is important to note that the majority of forest areas that fell below the 40 m3 cut-off definition had previously been selectively logged and had suffered substantial modification. These forests were not producing adequate regeneration and were often referred to as the `degraded' forests of East Gippsland. Based on the operating convention, it was generally regarded by both industry and the Forest Commission, that the only prospect for recovering sawlogs in these forests was to introduce a sawlog-pulpwood harvesting operation. In the view of the Forest Commission, this was also the only prospect for achieving adequate regeneration and possible rehabilitation.

This convention had the effect of subdividing the total sawlog resource figures into two categories. The magnitude of the division between economic to harvest and uneconomic to harvest on a sawlog-only basis can be seen from estimates produced in subsequent inquiries. These later estimates were set-out using the by then publicly formalised distinction between economic and uneconomic forest areas and respective resource levels. In the LCC's second review of East Gippsland during 1985-1986, forest areas carrying 40 m3 and above of sawlogs were estimated to cover 166,000 hectares (which included 87,000 hectares of regrowth forest) and contain 6.24 million m3 of sawlogs, while the area of forest falling below this cut-off point totalled 200,000 hectares and contained 3.67 million m3 of sawlogs (LCC 1986a:42-45). These figures show the impact of the convention behind this sub-division of the forests. They also show what was at stake for both the Forest Commission and the sawmilling industry. Without pulpwood harvesting, little over a third of the available sawlogs would not be produced, with associated pressures for cut-backs.

One possible reason this convention and its impact on sawlog availability was not publicly canvassed by the Forest Commission either during the LCC's review, nor until mid 1984, was that the Forest Commission believed it would be given Governmental approval to implement pulpwood harvesting across the total area of designated production forests in East Gippsland. Such approval would enable the Forest Commission to deliver its full estimated sawlog resource to sawmillers and facilitate a new industry based on the pulpwood resource (Wareing 1993: per comm). The Forest Commission's thinking on pulpwood harvesting in East Gippsland seems to have been that its introduction was a foregone conclusion. Only its timing was in question. Such thinking is clearly demonstrated in the position on land-use put by its Chairman back in early 1976. In a letter to the Victorian National Parks Association it was stated that:

Pulpwood harvesting was central to the Forest Commission's East Gippsland strategy and without it the Commission's forecast for the sawlog resource could not be achieved, making cut-backs in the sawmilling industry either more dramatic and/or considerably more urgent. For its resource estimates to hold up and in order to deliver on its long-term strategy and forecast sawlog availability, the Forest Commission most certainly would need to introduce pulpwood harvesting and not lose any further resources in designated production forests to preservation claims.

Resource estimates, their underlying assumptions, and the signifance of pulpwood harvesting and woodchipping to their calculation and their prospects of future delivery were not the subject of discursive contention or conflict during the LCC review. However, these questions would come to play a critical role in public discursive conflict. I will return to these questions during the next two chapters and trace their critical entry into the discursive formation over the forests. In this forthcoming analysis I will examine various critical points of discursive change and the power effect of various discourses dealing with the assumptions and operational definitions of what was to constitute sawlog producing forests. I will also consider a related and more challenging, if still politically marginal, discourse dealing with the more basic question of what constitutes a sawlog and its potential power effects.

For now, I return to examine the next phase of conflict; this was to concern the Forest Commission's attempts to implement pulpwood harvesting in East Gippsland.

In early 1979 the LCC's East Gippsland recommendations were formally accepted by the Hamer Government. The Forest Commission was then in a position to once again take up the running on its plan to implement pulpwood harvesting. It should be remembered that it was ten years since the Forest Commission had first advertised this resource for commercial development, and as we have seen, its attempts had continually been blocked. In its April 1979 submission to a Senate inquiry into Australia's forestry industry, the Forest Commission's discourse was couched in terms of `surplus pulpwood', and was linked with export prospects:

In September 1979 the Minister for Forests wrote a lengthy letter to the Premier on the subject of pulpwood harvesting in East Gippsland. The Minister suggested that as formal notice had been received to implement the LCC's recommendations for National parks and forest areas for hardwood production "...the embargo on pulpwood production on this score is no longer applicable" (Granter 1979). This letter also pointed out that as a result of the LCC's land-use review, the estimated availability of pulpwood in East Gippsland had been reduced from 600,000 to 450,000 m3 annually. This volume, the Minister suggested, was insufficient to establish an economically viable pulp mill. He argued that only when combined with the pulpwood resource in south-east NSW could such a project proceed. The Minister referred to long time delays involved in planning such a project and argued that "...export provides the only means by which the pulpwood currently produced in conjunction with sawlogs can be marketed quickly" (Granter 1979). Once again, the `waste' argument was used:

The Minister's proposal to the Premier was that local sawmillers be granted annual licences to produce pulpwood for sale to HDA rather than give HDA direct access to the East Gippsland resource. And further, that the granting of short-term licences would preserve the option of developing a local pulpmill:

The Premier initially agreed to this proposal (Hamer 1979). What is interesting in both the Minister's letter and the response from the Premier is that no mention is made of prior Government commitments, nor the LCC's recommendation, that a formal Environmental Effects Statement (EES) should be conducted prior to the commencement of pulpwood harvesting in East Gippsland. The Forest Commission's strategy was to present the introduction of pulpwood harvesting as a short-term trial-demonstration project, thus technically conforming to the LCC's recommendation that an EES was not required for experimental pulpwood harvesting. The Forest Commission was clearly looking for a way to avoid the delay of having to conduct an Environmental Effects Statement.

However, the Forest Commission's trial-demonstration proposal drew internal government opposition from the Ministry for Conservation. The Ministry for Conservation had the previous year been given responsibility for the Victorian Government's newly enacted legislation providing for Environment Effects Statements. Based on earlier commitments and LCC recommendations for an EES on major proposals for pulpwood harvesting, it argued that the size of the Forest Commission's trial-demonstration proposal required an EES (Wareing 1993: per comm). The Premier accepted this advice and directed the Forest Commission to prepare an EES. This was another delay to pulpwood harvesting and represented the Government setting up another discursive design which allowed public participation.

In June 1980 the major environmental groups become aware that the Forest Commisssion was to conduct an EES into pulpwood harvesting in East Gippsland (NFAC nd). At this time the ACF also received confirmation from the Commonwealth Government that Harris-Daishowa (HDA) had applied for a 400,000 tonne woodchip export licence for East Gippsland (Gilley 1981-82:10). This news was the spark that lead to renewed mobilisation around East Gippsland (Gilley 1981-82:10-11, NFAC nd). I will look at this new phase in the environmentalists' campaign in the next section. Now I return to look at the passage of the EES and the related strategic moves from the Forest Commission.

Under the procedures of the Environment Effects Act 1978 the Forest Commission in October 1980, released a draft outline of the proposed contents of its EES for public comment. The Commission then continued preparation of the EES. In January 1981 the Commission called for tenders to conduct a 100,000 tonne trial pulpwood harvesting program contingent on receiving the go-ahead by the EES. By February 1981, with public protest mounting over the prospects of woodchipping in East Gippsland, on advice from the Ministry of Conservation the Commission engaged W.D. Scott & Co P/L as consultants to collate and produce a final EES (Wareing 1993: per comm). By this time the Government had accepted the LCC's recommendations for the Alpine region and the decision was taken to extend the coverage of the EES to include all the uncommitted pulpwood resource in the `Eastern Division' of the Forest Commission (indicated on map 6.1).

The EES considered the proposal from the Forest Commission to harvest 800,000 m3 of pulpwood on an annual basis. This was to be done on an integrated basis with the production of sawlogs from forests in the entire Eastern Division, where sawlog commitments stood at 530,000 m3 annually. The EES concentrated on the environmental and socio-economic effects of harvesting pulpwood, and did not deal with the processing of the resource. On this point the EES was to argue that if the resource was to be used to support a new and complex domestic industrial processing plant such as a pulpmill, then a further EES would be required to examine any environmental impacts from such a development (Scott & Co 1981). The EES made no such reference to the need for an EES in the case of the resource being used to produce export woodchips, thus opening the way for the Forest Commission to commence pulpwood harvesting once the current EES was accepted.

The EES document was completed by July 1981 and concluded that the pulpwood harvesting proposal could proceed without any major environmental ill-effects, and pointed to substantial benefits in terms of increased State revenues and employment gains. According to standard procedure the EES document was placed on exhibition for public response from August to October 1981. However, in a preemptive move, the Forest Commission on receiving the EES without waiting for either the receipt of public submissions nor the statutory assessment of the EES by the Ministry for Conservation, got pulpwood harvesting underway. On July 17 1981, prior to the public release of the ESS, via a press release the Commission announced Government decisions to licence East Gippsland sawmill companies to harvest up to 100,000 m3 of pulpwood, on a trial basis for twelve months, commencing from July 1981. This pulpwood was to be transported directly to the HDA plant at Eden for export woodchips.

This move outraged the major environment groups who immediately announced a collective boycott of the EES process. This position was taken by the ACF, NFAC, CCV, Concerned Citizens of East Gippsland and the South Gippsland Conservation Society). According to environmental activists Parlane and Day, it was as early as January 1981 that State Cabinet had given the go-ahead for the trial pulpwood scheme. Parlane and Day also claim that HDA's export licence application for this resource was approved by Commonwealth Departments who had waived the requirement for a Commonwealth Environmental Impact Statement on the grounds that it was a trial project (Parlane and Day 1981-82:3). The Commonwealth Minister for Primary Industry responsible for granting the HDA export licence was also the local member for Gippsland.

The Commission's trial pulpwood harvesting scheme commenced in October 1981, with the Ministry for Conservation still to undertake its statutory assessment of the Scott EES, taking into consideration all the public submissions received. The Ministry was then to make its recommendations to the Minister for Conservation, who would decide whether to approve the Forest Commission's proposal for complete pulpwood harvesting. Although the assessment of the EES document and the large amount of critical public submissions had been completed by December 1981, the Minister, Vasey Houghton, refused to release it to the public. The final political fate of the Scott EES and the trial pulpwood harvesting scheme were decided after the forthcoming 1982 State elections and will be considered in the next chapter. Here, it is necessary to direct attention to developments on the environmentalists' side of the East Gippsland conflict in the lead-up to the State elections.

After the LCC's East Gippsland review, environmental organisations and activists directed their attention to a campaign over the Victorian Alps. This spirited campaign coincided with the LCC's review of the Alpine study area, which ran from 1977 to early 1980. What is noticable about this campaign is not only its militant nature, but that the discourse deployed by the environmentalists showed clear signs of abandoning traditional conservation rhetoric in favour of a rhetoric adopted from the emerging positions of deep ecology, which as noted in Chapter Two is based on the philosophy of `naturalism' and is reflective of the `new class' basis of environmental politics with its post-distributional claims and demands. The goal of protecting the Alps from commercial exploitation was raised as preservation on behalf of `nature' itself, rather than for passive human benefits such as recreational use.

With the Government's acceptance of the LCC recommendations on the Alps in 1980, events in East Gippsland began once again to command the attention of environmentalists. As previously mentioned, it was the Forest Commission's announcement that it was to prepare an EES on pulpwood harvesting, news that HDA was seeking a 400,00 tonne woodchip export licence for East Gippsland and the calling of tenders for a trial pulpwood scheme that were the spark and focus of a renewed campaign and mobilisation over the East Gippsland forests (Gilley 1981-82:10, NFAC 1981). In response to the release for public comment of draft guidelines of the EES on pulpwood harvesting in East Gippsland, the NFAC produced a radically different set of guidelines centred on the argument that the EES should study alternatives to clearfelling and pulpwood harvesting. Environmental activists regarded the rejection of this proposal by the Forest Commission as a clear breach of the philosophy and legislated procedures for Environmental Effects Statements.

The public campaign over East Gippsland was intensified. In March 1981 the Native Forest Action Council (NFAC) organised the first Native Forest Week. Using film, public meetings and street stalls, the proposed woodchipping of East Gippsland was the major theme. A dossier focussing on the alleged legal and administrative irregularities involved with the Forest Commission's pulpwood EES was released. Environment organisations such as the NFAC and ACF criticised the ESS process focussing on three major points. First, the calling of tenders for the 12 month trial woodchipping scheme in January 1981 was regarded as preempting the EES, and was criticised for not containing any provision for environmental monitoring or public review procedures. Second, the appointment of W.D. Scott & Co to prepare the EES document was critised as being a public relations exercise, and the allegation was made that there was a corporate connection between this company and HDA. This allegation was based on the fact that a former directer of Scotts was also a director of HDA (Gilley 1981-82:9). Third, it was claimed that wide ranging studies of the ecological significance of East Gippsland, recently undertaken by the Ministry for Conservation, were not being used in the preparation of the EES. Environmentalists argued that these studies were "...the only comprehensive baseline data available and thus are critical to any assessment of environmental impact" (Parlane and Day 1981-82:3).

The NFAC developed the strategy of using a focussed public petition, borrowed directly from New Zealand forest protests (Durkin 1993:per comm). This petition was launched in June 1981. This seven point statement, the `Sassafras Declaration', was planned to attract 50,000 signatories by World Environment Day on 5 June 1982. The Sassafras Declaration is worth quoting as it presents the ongoing themes and demands of the environmentists' East Gippsland campaign:

As part of the boycott of the EES process, environmental activists demanded the release of studies conducted by the Ministry for Conservation's environmental studies division. These studies dealt with sites of botanical, geological, geomorphological and zoological significance in East Gippsland. Under pressure, the Government released the studies in September 1981, and along with others recently available, including Monash University's inventory of wilderness areas of Victoria, they provided a scientific information base for the environment movement's claims over East Gippsland. The studies were used to support demands for specific ecosystem preservation and the restriction of logging.

In East Gippsland itself a small group of mostly new settlers, inspired by the alternative life-stlye movements, purchased land in forest areas along the Bonang Highway. The group formed the `Concerned Residents of East Gippsland' (CROG), which acted as an anti-timber industry network, giving a local face to the mostly Melbourne based environmentalist campaign. This group organised its first Forest Forever Camp in October 1981. In December 1981, the NFAC organised a protest demonstration outside Parliament and during the summer of 1981/82 took the East Gippsland woodchipping issue to Melbourne's suburbs with petitions, leaflets and film nights; also into the holiday towns of East Gippsland, where information tents were established at Lakes Entrance, Marlo and Mallacoota.

In early 1982, with a state election pending, the environmentalists' strategy was to influence the opposition Australian Labor Party (ALP). The East Gippsland issue was central in advocacy talks conducted by NFAC activists at many suburban branch meetings of the ALP. Aimed at having the ALP party platform re-written to reflect environmentalists' demands on East Gippsland, the NFAC employed an ALP insider, Candy Strathan, to act as a lobbyist to change ALP policy (NFAC nd). This intensive lobbying of the ALP opposition was successful, with the announcement in February 1982 of its pre-election policy. This included: opposition to woodchip schemes, commitments to establish a National park of `real significance' in East Gippsland, and a commitment to review the structure and role of the Victorian timber industry. The NFAC in association with the ACF and the CCV published advertisements supporting the election of the ALP. The NFAC also published its pre-election demands for new National parks in East Gippsland (see Map 6.2) with the following claim:

The size of these park claims and the associated discourse of `nature' preservation would present real problems for any incoming government. Their impact on the activities of the Forest Commission and the timber industry would be immense. A qualitatively different situation had emerged compared to the past practice when dealing with `nature' preservation, which had remained largely uncontested until the late 1960s. For example, in the mid 1960s, the Forest Commission, when planning new areas of East Gippsland for logging, would provide only small pockets of preserved flora and fauna. This is demonstrated in the following instruction from the Chairman of the Forest Commission, dealing with new logging areas:

Times had dramatically changed by the end of the 1970s. Not only in East Gippsland, but around Australia bitter conflicts were emerging over the use and control of native forests. These conflicts were now based on fundamentally different discourses on `nature', held by the protagonists. Environmental organisations had expanded around campaigns over native forests, and in 1979 the events at Terania Creek, NSW showed a new militancy added to the repertoire of action of the environment movement. Watson provides a good summary of the situation that had developed by the end of the decade:

Environmentalists and the timber industry faced the prospect of dealing with a Labor government in Victoria, and from 1983 with a national Labor government. The next two chapters will deal with the progress of the East Gippsland forest conflict under Labor.

This chapter has traced the emergence and development of discursive conflict over the native forests of East Gippsland from 1968 to the election to Government of the ALP in Victoria in 1982. During this period the issues and questions which critically shaped this new social conflict were the prospects of woodchipping and the demand for substantial National parks in the forests. Around these two central discursive objects, social forces formed and deployed discourses and organised political strategies and collective actions.

As mentioned in earlier chapters, these opposing social forces pursued resourcism within the forests (capital, workers and government foresters), against the preservation of the forests (environment movement organisations and their mass support base). Woodchipping and National parks were what these collective actors would struggle over in their fight for the forests. These issues became the dominant discursive objects of this struggle during the period 1968 to 1982. They would constitute the core of what we would call a conflictual discursive formation over the forests. They displayed a continual prominence and forceful articulation throughout the events covered in this chapter. Collective action and strategy around these issues would progressively see the rival social forces constitute themselves as class actors in a struggle for the forests. This political (class) struggle became highly problematic for government.

The struggle over woodchipping and National parks was however, played out against the background of the material circumstances of wood extraction in the East Gippsland forests. During this period (1969-1982) the policy of over-cutting East Gippsland's forest remained in place and annual harvests of sawlogs reached record levels. There was no movement towards investment in value-adding technology. The industry remained rudimentary and high volume. The Griffin line, blocking the industry from high value-adding forests, remained in operation until 1980.

However, what distinguishes this period is the introduction of two new contentious elements, each with the possibility of having critical effects (effects of power) on the level and gravity of the historical unsustainablity of the East Gippsland timber industry. First, in 1968 the introduction in Australia of export woodchipping presented the prospect of a commercial use for the logging waste (pulpwood). Its introduction in East Gippsland could change the structure of the industry and expand the size of the area used annually for logging. Second, during this period the advent of an environment movement which would oppose the introduction of woodchipping and demand substantial new National parks. The environment movement and supporters as new collective actors could threaten and diminish the extent of the forests given over to wood extraction.

The questions of woodchipping, National parks and the sustainability of wood production, would operate in what Foucault calls a `relational dependency' to each other (see Chapter Four). The question of the sustainability of wood production did not become an object of discursive conflict throughout the period covered in this chapter. It remained as a key part of the material (non-discursive) formation affecting both the forests and the people dependent on the timber industry.

The established sawlog industry continued to operate on the basis of conventions which confined sawlog-only logging to forests carrying 40 m3 of sawlogs per hectare and with a fixed definition of what a sawlog was. The effect of this convention was that without integrated sawlog-pulpwood harvesting, a third of the estimated sawlog resource would not be recovered. Without the introduction of woodchipping the scale and impact of the over-cutting would increase. The National park claims by environmentalists in the main covered the sawlog-only forests (40 m3 and above) and if realised would further add to the scale and impact of the unsustainable logging practices. I have noted the relational dependencies between these three questions, where change in one question could dramatically affect the material prospects of the others. Any change would have a powerful effect on the nature of the working resource estimates.

The underlying nature of the government's wood resource estimates, particularly, the 40 m3 convention and the locked-in definition of a sawlog, would become central in later conflicts. The coming chapters will show how these above mentioned factors entered as contentious discursive objects into the ongoing discursive formation over the forests. I will be particularly interested in tracing critical discursive changes within these new public discourses. These coming events will illustrate Foucault's theoretical concern with the power effects of events of transformation or mutation of discourse.

I suggest 1968 as a starting point to a history of the contested forests of East Gippsland. In 1968 the commercial prospects for utilising logging `waste', conventionally known as pulpwood, had materialised. The struggle to control the introduction of pulpwood harvesting, initially not contested by environment groups, contained intense corporate `resource politics'. The environment movement entered this struggle in late 1973 with the ACF winning a government assurance that final development decisions would be taken after the LCC's forthcoming land-use review of East Gippsland. Despite this, the struggle for the pulpwood continued and was given public attention in early 1974 when APM P/L attempted to gain a long-term resource area concession covering over one half of the resource. This exercise of power was defeated by a combination of opposing forces. In the wake of its political defeat over the Little Desert (see Chapter Five), the Government announced its embargo on pulpwood harvesting (woodchipping) pending the outcome of the LCC review. This was a strategic exercise of power by environmentalists, for while woodchipping remained undecided, the ACF had achieved the deferment of a possible go-ahead until early 1979 when the LCC's recommendations were finally accepted. This strategic blockage did not please industry, nor government foresters. For it involved an additional mechanism of governmental inquiry and advice overarching the Forest Commission/industry relationship. This mechanism was the newly created LCC, to which all contesting forces would have to turn with positional discourses.

The LCC is a discursive design of governmentality. It is a strong indication of the new governing of `nature'. It functions as a mechanism of inquiry, assessment and deliberation, producing `official discourses of the state'. The LCC's public review of land-use in East Gippsland (1974-1977) was a discursive event which not only enabled government to reign in the forces contesting the forests, its functioning required these forces to produce concrete claims and justifying public discourses. From these discursive processes and the LCC's `official' discourses a firm shape was given to a `conflictual discursive formation' over the forests.

This `discursive formation', its surrounding public campaigns and governmental problematic, as I noted, was dominated by two core discursive objects, woodchipping and National parks. In the context of the LCC review, the key discursive statements produced by environmental organisations reveal a critical change in the basis of environmental discourse. This is a change from the traditional `wise-use' and conservation of `natural resources', to the preservation of `nature'. In this new discourse, `nature' was not to be associated with a resource to be commercially exploited, rather `nature' had rights to be protected. It needed to be preserved against commercial exploitation. In support of this discursive position the ACF lodged its ambit National park claims before the LCC. This involved 55 % of the public land in East Gippsland. It was part of a new and substantially more confrontational and politically radical environmental politics. This, I have argued, indicates the `new class' basis of conflict over `nature' with its post-distributional demands and political discourses. It set up a continuing contest and struggle between the forces of resourcism and preservation in the forests. In the East Gippsland context, the underlying political target was the curtailment and eventual eviction of wood production from native forests.

In defense of their existing position the industry and government foresters were forced (what Foucault means by power as an action on another action) to go before an inquiry of government and publically argue their case for resourcism in the forests. This was something that until the LCC review, had historically been handled in private with the Government. A critical part of this new discursive formation was the production of `counter discourses' on the issue of the remaining pulpwood left in the forests as a result of clearfelling on a sawlog-only harvesting regime which had existed in East Gippsland since the 1960s. Each side produced a discourse on this `residue'. As will be shown later, the conflict over `waste' would not disappear, it would be articulated across the events of this forest conflict to the present and remains the central undecided issue in East Gippsland.

The LCC produced its `official discourse' in 1977. This involved a limited withdrawal of timber resources to establish new National Parks. The LCC had not made a recommendation either for or against pulpwood harvesting, but recommended an Environmental Effects Statement. These two recommendations/actions had significant power effects. The new parks, while not reflecting the size of the ACF's ambit claim, caused a new line to be drawn on the East Gippsland map. This line legally demarcated the first preservation claims of environmentalists, another reshaping of the forests. Its recommendation for an environmental assessment of pulpwood did not please industry nor government foresters, for this would open the issue to further public inquiry and cause further blockages to the plans of capital and governmental foresters. Environmentalists were at least pleased on this account.

By early 1979, when the LCC's recommendations were officially enacted by Government, a considerably expanded environment movement was involved in a number of significant regional forest and wilderness conflicts. All these campaigns were conducted on the basis of a `nature' first eco-philosophy where the preservation of native forests and wilderness was the core agenda for action. Environmentalists were now prepared to take direct action protests in the forests.

It was in this context that the Forest Commission attempted the passage of its required EES into pulpwood harvesting in East Gippsland. This highly public discursive process immediately became the key focus of Victorian environment groups and produced only limited results for the Forest Commission and industry, with the controversial limited trial pulpwood scheme supplying HDA with export woodchips (1981). The continued blockage of the complete plans of the Commission for pulpwood was a political achievement of the environment movement. It represents the power effect of the movement's mobilisation, deployment of discourse and political strategies. However, the question of woodchipping remained undecided. The environment movement had renewed its East Gippsland campaign, it had strategically influenced the then Opposition, forced the public release of environmental studies on East Gippsland and launched its pre-election National park demands. In the next chapter, the conflict over the fate of the East Gippsland forests is examined in the context of the election of a State Labor government, and its use of discursive designs in an attempt to fully inquire into this `problematic of government'. We will further encounter the growth of governmentality surrounding the forests.