Australian plantation statistics update

Overview

Australian plantation statistics is published every year. It supports strategic forest industry planning and decision-making by presenting information on total plantation area, new planting and ownership.

The plantation areas are presented by jurisdiction and National Plantation Inventory regions for softwood and hardwood plantation types, and species, based on data collected from private growers and grower representatives and public state and territory agencies.

In this report, 2020‒21 data are compared with data from the 2004-05, 2009-10, 2014-15 and 2019-20 5 yearly spatial plantation reports (5 and 1 year intervals).

The infographic shows the total plantation area declined by 31,000 hectares and 1500 hectares of new plantations were established. New South Wales has the largest share of the softwood estate and Tasmania hasthe largest share of the hardwood estate.

A high resolution version of the Australian Plantation statistics 2022 - Infographic is available in the download section below

Figure 1 The total plantation area declined further in 2020-21 as some hardwood plantations were converted to another land use and revisions to the softwood plantation estate

Total plantation area in 2020¬-21 was 1.74 million hectares, with around 1.01 million hectares of softwood plantation and 711 thousand hectares of hardwood plantations.

Figure 2 Together New South Wales and Victoria have over 50 % of the softwood plantations and Tasmania and Western Australia have over 50 % of the hardwood plantations in 2020-21

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Figure 3 New plantation establishment remained low at around 1500 hectares in 2020-21

In 2020-21, around 1500 hectares of new plantations were established, consistent with low levels of annual plantation establishment since 2013-14.

Figure 4 Most softwood plantations are radiata pine plantations and are managed for sawlog production. The Murray Valley has the greatest proportion of radiata plantations followed by the Green Triangle

The southern National Plantation inventory regions are mainly planted with radiata pine while the northern regions are mainly planted with southern pines and hoop pine.

Figure 5 The majority of hardwood plantations are Tasmanian blue gum and shining gum mainly managed for pulpwood production

Western Australia and Tasmania National Plantation Inventory regions have the largest share of hardwood plantations. These plantations are mainly managed for pulpwood production.

Figure 6 Plantation ownership by jurisdiction in 2020–21 shows the majority of Australia’s plantations continue to be privately owned

In 2020-21 New South Wales has the largest share of publicly owned plantations, Victoria has the largest share of privately owned plantations and Western Australia has the largest share of joint venture plantations.

Figure 7 Plantation ownership has seen increasing dominance of institutional investors as they purchased most MIS plantations and some public plantations

The current ownership structure of the national estate has been relatively stable following an adjustment period in 2013-14, at the end of the MIS period. MIS companies transferred ownership of plantations to institutional investors and farm foresters.