A landowner will have to pay the price after destroying trees without permission on a Tasmanian island.
Alan Robert Smith was fined $90,000 last month for clearing native vegetation on King Island without approval. The vegetation removed included threatened native forest and a wetland.
A photo shared by Pulse Tasmania showed an open area with the remnants of what had been demolished.
The Forest Practices Authority investigated the property after discovering the clearing. Smith was hit with several charges, including unauthorized clearing of trees and failing to comply with a notice to cease forest practices.
Acting chief forest practices officer Willem Mulder said a formal request was issued for Smith to stop the operation but that the landowner continued to bulldoze the vegetation.
"The forest practices system provides a process for identifying and considering environmental and other sensitive values through a certified forest practices plan," Mulder said. "This unlawful land clearing would have been avoided if the forest practices process had been followed."
Scientists issued a warning last year after discovering that more than one-third of the world's trees are at risk of extinction. The crisis affects 192 countries. Clearing land for farming and logging are listed as the biggest threats.
According to scientists, Tasmania's reduction of native forest logging has been a factor in lowering its heat-trapping gas pollution, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported. The state in 2014 became the first Australian jurisdiction to achieve net zero emissions and has done so every year since, the government reports.
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Heck yes! 💯 The hefty penalty Smith received got social media users talking. On Facebook, some people thought it wasn't a harsh enough punishment — and they had suggestions.
One commenter said Smith "should be made to forfeit ownership of the land immediately and be held responsible for rehabilitation costs."
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Another user proposed the landowner "replant the native vegetation" as retribution.
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