Localisation and community resilience in a time of transition.

Kalbar Operations Pty Ltd, a company with no experience operating a mine, is proposing a massive open-cut mineral sands mine at the Fingerboards, 20km north west of Bairnsdale in East Gippsland.

This proposal will come with a large environmental cost, huge impact on local farmland and the local economy, and is strongly opposed by the majority of locals.

The state government has opened up the opportunity to express your opposition to the mine. You can send a submission in response to the Environment Effects Statement (EES) for the project. Submissions must be lodged by 5pm on 29 October 2020.  

The isolation of regional voices & some visions for building resilience.

By Zianna Fuad

I often find politics becomes removed from it’s real-life repercussions. I often forget the way decisions ripple out over time, changing the ways of things like a railroad switch.  I forever remind myself that politics is not locked in a Parliament room, it’s real and felt and often long-lasting and each time I forget, I am reminded of the cushioning of privilege and its own abstracting lens.  

Friends of the Earth is proudly hosting Professor Poulos to speak about Pesticides in Food.  Emphasis during the presentation will include:  Different susceptibilities to pesticides (based on genetics, age and development in the womb) and acute and chronic health impacts.

Media release. October 24, 2017

Environmental organisation Friends of the Earth today published results of a statewide survey of pesticide pollution in the State’s drinking water supplies.

The results were sourced from Freedom of Information (FoI) Requests from all of the State’s drinking water authorities. The multiple FOI .requests covered the years 2007 through to 2016.

“This is the first time such a survey has apparently been conducted” said FoE spokesperson Anthony Amis.  “Improved monitoring by some water authorities since 2012 has allowed a more accurate understanding about what pesticides are being washed into water supplies.”

Media release March 7, 2017

The announcement this morning that the Victorian Coalition will put forward an amendment which would see the moratorium on conventional gas drilling lifted has been met with anger from farming communities and environmental groups.

“The Coalition put the moratorium in place in 2012. It has constantly berated the ALP for changing it’s position on gas mining, yet has now performed a backflip of huge proportions” said Friends of the Earth (FoE) campaigner Ursula Alquier.

The following media release is from the CSIRO (February 2017) and notes that Australia’s average wheat yields did not increase from 1990 to 2015. In fact, Australia’s wheat yield potential declined by 27 per cent over the past quarter of a century and that this decline was 'consistent with the higher end of future climate change projections for the wheat zone over the coming 26 years.'

Media release February 8, 2017

Today the Lower House of the Victorian parliament is debating the Resources Legislation Amendment (Fracking Ban) Bill 2016, which will permanently ban fracking in the state.

This debate is unusual, because the ALP, Greens, Coalition and minor parties have all announced their support for the ban. “This highlights the massive community opposition to onshore gas drilling in Victoria” said Friends of the Earth co-ordinator Cam Walker.

Victoria is the major growing area of apples and pears in Australia. In 2008, Victoria produced 39% of Australia’s apples and 89% of the nation’s pears.

Information session

Bright aerial spraying.

This forum will be an opportunity for residents to hear about the impacts of aerial spraying of the herbicides Clopyralid, Glyphosate and Metsulfuron Methyl in the plantations around Bright and surrounding townships.

Saturday May 16, 4.30pm