Construction work was stopped yesterday when a group of protesters from Greenpeace scaled a 50-metre crane in protest of the use of illegal rainforest logged timber on one of Sydney’s most prominent development sites.
The group of seven were arrested for illegally entering Fraser’s Central Park construction site, climbing the crane and unfurling a banner saying “Stop Illegal Timber”.
Touted as one of Sydney’s greenest projects, and previously featured on TheUrbanDeveloper.com, the current stage – No. 1 Central Park on Broadway – is thought to be using tonnes of plywood from a mill in Sarawak, Malaysia in the construction of concrete foundations despite not being certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) or the Program for the Enforcement of Forest Certification (PEFC).
According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the photographs used on the site showed a logo that was traced back to the Baramas mill in Sarawak which has previously been associated with serious breaches of sustainable logging practices.
It is understood that the contractor, Watpac, had sourced the wood from Australian Wood Panels, a subsidiary company of Malaysian logging giant Samling and that the product was labeled as “Legal and Sustainable Mayalsian Resource”.
In an interview with SMH, a spokeswoman for Frasers Property Australia said it would conduct a thorough audit of all timber on the site, and find out where it was sourced from and that it was determined to make the development sustainable and meet the five green star criteria if possible.
“To date Frasers have understood that the timber used at Central Park complied with the Green Building Council of Australia’s requirements for 5 Green Star certification,” a spokeswoman for the company said.
“If this proves not to be the case, we will immediately instruct Watpac to address the issue.”
It is estimated that up to $800 million worth of imported unsustainable timber is sold in Australia each year.
Source: The Urban Developer
