A History of Tasmanian Forest Campaigns by Helen Gee.
On Wednesday December 5 at Fullers Bookshop in Launceston Launceston educationalist,Christopher Strong launched this new Tasmanian Book which aims to document the Tasmanian Forest Campaigns.
The Author,Helen Gee is a Tasmanian writer and environmentalist best known for her compilation of The South West Book,A Tasmanian Wilderness,first published by the Australian Conservation Foundation in 1978 said "The Tasmanian wilderness and the battles waged there, on it's behalf over the past century,have inspired people around the world.
As the last of the special Gondwana Forests on this island disappear thousands are becoming increasingly outraged.
Over 100 interviews with men and women of great moral convictions formed the basis for the book,including artists,activists,politicians and enviromentalists like Senator Bob Brown.
The book records the peaceful,direct actions that occurred at Jackeys Marsh,the Lemonthyme,Farmhouse Creek,the Tarkine,Mother Cummings and the Styx.
Already the forest outrage in Tasmania has stimulated a campaign in Japan to end old growth logging in Australia.
Helen hopes that the book of great political relevance will further precipitate awareness,debate and real progress to the end of oldgrowth logging.
Christopher Strong described the book as a "people's book which demonstrates the Wilderness Society's commitment to a peaceful philosophy.
Mr Strong paid tribute to Helen who has been active in the environmental movement since the Lake Pedder Campaign. The book is about understanding the forests and about being made whole by them.
Christopher said it is "an epic saga,presented in a regional context -all about heroic exploits - easy for the layman to work through and it allows us to see the impacts of these assaults on the forests.
Mr Strong was also concerned that "Local Governments have not yet realized the impact of what is going on around them" He commended the the community outrage section as it reported on what the people do in fact feel.
He considered that we need leadership and government that is not susceptible to the influences of the corporations over the people.
A tribute was also paid to Helen's campaign to fund the book from a variety of community sources.
Wilderness Society News
Other launches
Sydney Wednesday 12th December 2001 6:00pm Wilderness Society , shop C03,Centrepoint ,Castlereagh St,
By Dr Mary White* and the E-capella choir
* Mary E White DSc, palaeobotanist and renown author of The Greening of Gondwana amnd many other books on Australia's 400 million year plant story. She wrote the Foreword to For the Forests in which she refers to the Gondwanan forests of Tasmania as "a living dinosaur deserving of complete protection"
Hobart - Sunday 9th December 2001 at 11am by Dagmar Nordberg architect, lecturer in environmental communication and winner of Sweden's prestigious ICA Environmental Award 2000
Waterside Pavilion Mawson Place Constitution Dock
Melbourne - Wednesday November 28, 2001 at 5:30pm for 6pm by Karen Alexander President & Director Australian Bush Heritage Fund 1996-2001 Hub Cap 174 Burnley St Richmond, Victoria
