The Australian Government is committed to supporting Australia’s forest industries. The case studies featured on this page tell the stories of recipients of our grant programs, highlighting their projects that will deliver Australia’s future forest products.
Accelerate Adoption of Wood Processing Innovation program
The Accelerate Adoption of Wood Processing Innovation Program awarded $100.72 million in grant funding to 33 grantees across Australia. The grant funding aims to enhance the forestry sectors’ ability to supply more of Australia’s wood demands into the future.
Highland Pine Products Pty Limited – Oberon, New South Wales
(Duration 3 minutes 55 seconds)
Introduction:
This is the transcript of a video case study produced by the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry as part of the Accelerate Adoption of Wood Processing Innovation Program. It was filmed with Highland Pine Products on-site in Oberon, NSW in 2024.
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The Accelerate Adoption of Wood Processing Innovation grant program provided co-investment with privately-owned wood processors to adopt new and upgraded wood processing facilities.
The Australian Government program awarded $100.72 million in funding to 33 grantees.
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Highland Pine Products Pty Ltd received $4.02 million in funding to upgrade a range of equipment and improve their processing capabilities.
[0:18]
Mike Bitzer: At the end of March this year we tore out all of the existing front-end saw log equipment and we put in a whole new saw line, where this new technology – which has been around for quite a while – it actually optimises it before we make the first cut.
We’ve got two scanners that first scan the log and decide what the shape of the log is, and then optimise a board pattern for that log. Then we run it through what we call a set of turning rolls, which then turn that log into the optimum position.
We then scan it again to confirm that it got to that position, or how close it got to that position. And then it makes, then we scan, we have three more scanners which re-scan the log again and say “actually, if you move it 2cm to the left or to the right, you can recover a little bit more fibre out of this log”. So it scans, positions, re-scans it again before we make our first cut.
The aim of this project is to get 3% more fibre out of the log volume that we put in. So, fundamentally getting out of every log, we’re getting 3% more boards out of it than we have in the past. And with the shortage of logs in New South Wales particularly after the bush fires, it’s a really important part of feeding the structural housing market.
We have high grade timber, we have packaging material timber, and we then, some of that goes out in green form which then goes to the packaging businesses in Australia. All the rest is then dried. We have kilns and boilers on site which we dry all of the timber. Then that timber, after it sits for a period of time, it then gets processed through our dry mill, which we have an electronic grading system which we use x-ray and optical to grade our timber to the highest value. That then gets packaged up, wrapped in plastic, and sold to the framing truss and the home center stores.
Radiata has its intricacies. It has large knots. So larger, slower growing trees have smaller knots which is why it’s important to optimise everything through not only the optimisation we do through the saw mill, but also the optimisation we do through the dry mill process to grade the best quality MGP timber out for the framing market and structural market that we can.
You know, you see a lot of computers around in this room, we need people who look at how they’re working and what their processes are, so we’ve added some positions, some high-value positions in terms of optimisation quality throughout the plant.
It’s a good material to use for housing products. It also stores carbon as we grow the tree, and it keeps that carbon stored obviously inside the frame of your house, or in your truss. And as you replant more, we have about a 28-to-30-year rotation here for our logs, it captures more carbon, stores it, and then we cut it up.
We’re pretty important where we’re located in the Central West, we’re the closest sawmill to the Sydney basin, which is one of the fastest growing areas in Australia so you know, we bring logs from as far as 600km away, so it’s an important part of the Oberon district but it’s also an important part of the New South Wales housing market.
[3:37]
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Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry logo appears on screen
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Find out more about our work to support Australia’s forestry industry at https://www.agriculture.gov.au/agriculture-land/forestry
[3:55]
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NSFP Southwood Pty Ltd
(Duration 2 minutes 42 seconds)
Introduction
This is the transcript of a video case study produced by the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry as part of the Accelerate Adoption of Wood Processing Innovation Program. It was filmed with NSFP Southwood on-site in Lonnavale, Tasmania in 2025.
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The Accelerate Adoption of Wood Processing Innovation grant program provided co-investment with privately-owned wood processors to adopt new and upgraded wood processing facilities.
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The Australian Government program awarded $100.72 million in funding to 33 grantees.
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NSFP Southwood Pty Ltd received $4.96 million to upgrade the NSFP Southwood sawmill which will see a range of log processing, sawing and handling equipment installed to significantly increase the capacity of the mill.
[0:14]
Andrew Walker: Neville Smith Forest Products has been operating in Tasmania for around one hundred years. We’re one of the largest hardwood sawmilling groups in Australia. We produce high-quality Tasmanian Oak and we also produce high-quality plantation nitens into a varied number of uses both for the building industry and also the palette manufacturing sector.
With regards to the grant, the project for us was to update our facilities here and have the ability to saw, dock, stack and manufacture fully-certified plantation palettes for the Australian market.
So we had an opportunity with the plantation resource base to upgrade low-grade logs that were otherwise destined for woodchip, and turn them into a much higher value product, a much needed product which is hardwood timber palettes for the Australian supply chain. So our customer for these palettes is one of Australia’s largest palette pooling groups who enable supply chains to supply products across the Australian market. So we would manufacture anywhere from 1200 to 1800 palettes a day, depending on demand.
We received a $5 million federal grant for this project which enabled us to basically put in a new optimised docking line, a new stacking line, a new palette assembly line and painting line to make this project a reality for us. So the total project was $12 million, and obviously the grant component was $5 million of that $12 million.
The grant enabled us to actually take this project from concept to reality and without the grant it would have been difficult to actually get the project up off the ground.
The other benefit of the project is it enables us to increase our sovereign manufacturing capability and potentially reduce the importing of timber for this use.
We’ve added around 20 people, 20 new full-time equivalents to our facility here at Southwood. Our new line would be the most efficient and modern manufacturing palette line in Australia, if not the Southern Hemisphere.
[2:32]
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Find out more about our work to support Australia’s forestry industry at https://www.agriculture.gov.au/agriculture-land/forestry
[2:37]
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[2:42]
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Western Junction Sawmill Pty Ltd – Western Junction, Tasmania
(Duration 2 minutes 56 seconds)
Introduction
This is the transcript of a video case study produced by the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry as part of the Accelerate Adoption of Wood Processing Innovation Program. It was filmed with Western Junction Sawmill on-site in Launceston, Tasmania in 2025.
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The Accelerate Adoption of Wood Processing Innovation grant program provided co-investment with privately-owned wood processors to adopt new and upgraded wood processing facilities.
[0:05]
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The Australian Government program awarded $100.72 million in funding to 33 grantees.
[0:10]
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Western Junction Sawmill Pty Ltd received $1.98 million in to purchase and install a new scanning twin band resaw that will enable higher recoveries and better use of the plantation nitens sawlogs.
[0:15]
Vince Hurley: So we bought the site in 2021 because we saw the opportunity to take a small sawmill with good bones and produce a value-adding facility on this site. It was processing primarily Tasmanian Oak logs and we’ve turned that into a sawmill that now processes small Tasmanian Oak and small plantation saw logs that were otherwise destined to go into export woodchip.
So the value-adding facility will be producing products that will go into our masslam products, large columns and beams to replace concrete and steel, into staircase components, furniture components, joinery components and benchtops.
The grant that we received was for just over $1.9 million. The original project was to cost us around $5 million. So the project involved a new, high strain twin band saw, the in-feeds and out-feeds for that twin band saw, the control systems for the new band saw, the control systems for the head rig that feeds the twin band saw and the electrical switch gear to supply the power to the band saw.
Twenty-four people on the site at Western Junction. We’re looking to grow that significantly.
So the logs come into the sawmill, they go through a large band saw that breaks the log down into a flitch. That flitch then goes to the twin band saw that breaks that flitch down into slabs of timber, and the recovery from that twin band saw goes to one bench, a saw bench, that creates recovery, smaller pieces of wood from the twin band saw. We also have another bench that can take the odd-shaped logs and turn them into slabs as well. All of that material goes out to the automatic stackers where it’s stacked into packs of timber.
The great benefits to Western Junction Sawmill are a significant increase in fibre recovery from logs, a very significant increase in production through-put, and a very big increase in the safety of the sawmill.
The employees here have had the opportunity to upskill. So they’re going from manual handling to being operators and being remote from the timber and operating remote control. This has been great for upskilling, it’s also been great for the employees to learn those new skills.
[2:43]
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Find out more about our work to support Australia’s forestry industry at https://www.agriculture.gov.au/agriculture-land/forestry
[2:51]
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[2:56]
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Support Plantation Establishment program – case studies
The Support Plantation Establishment program is helping establish new long-rotation softwood and hardwood plantation forests across Australia.
Forestry Corporation of New South Wales
(Duration 1 mins 49 secs)
Introduction
This is the transcript of a video case study produced by the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry as part of the Support Plantation Establishment Program. It was filmed with the Forestry Corporation of NSW on-site in Oberon, NSW in 2024.
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The Support Plantation Establishment Program is a $73.76 million Australian Government Grant Program
The funding supports the establishment of new long-rotation softwood and hardwood plantation forests across Australia
[0:11]
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The Forestry Corporation of NSW were awarded $2.54 million in funding to support the establishment of over 1,200 hectares of new plantation forests
Claire Kirby: The Forestry Corporation of NSW here in the Central West manage about 80,000 hectares of radiata pine plantation.
We’re in our Dog Rocks State Forest at the moment and we’re surrounded by mature plantation.
For over 100 years, Forestry Corporation have been planting Pinus Radiata in the Central West. It’s a good growing species for this area because of our elevation and our annual rainfall and the seedlings like the growing conditions here.
The grant funds help with the establishment activities that will occur to establish the pine plantation.
So to establish a new plantation requires specialised site preparation contractors who drive dozers and excavators to cultivate the soil. We have specialised contractors who will do our weed control, and that will be by a tractor-based system. Then our planting contractors will come in and do the manual hand-planting of the seedlings.
So we plant the seedlings during winter in July and August where soil moisture conditions are suitable for the establishment of the seedlings early on.
The grant funding that we have been issued today is setting us up for the future so that we can establish plantations now which will then be used for the future demand for timber products in thirty years time.
[1:38]
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Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry logo appears on screen
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Applications are open for grant round three of the Support Plantation Establishment program.
Find out more and apply at GrantConnect.
[1:46]
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Plantation Pine Products Australia
(Duration 1 minute 46 seconds)
Introduction
This is the transcript of a video case study produced by the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry as part of the Support Plantation Establishment Program. It was filmed with Plantation Pine Products on-site in Oberon, NSW in 2024.
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The Support Plantation Establishment Program is a $73.76 million Australian Government Grant Program
The funding supports the establishment of new long-rotation softwood and hardwood plantation forests across Australia
[0:11]
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Plantation Pine Products were awarded $7.04 million in funding to support the establishment of 3,520 hectares of new plantation forests
Angus Spreckley: This plantation was planted in August this year with Pinus Radiata at 1,600 stems a hectare.
It will be 30 meter tall trees, probably about 600 stems a hectare. This will be thinned twice, down to about 600 stems a hectare during the rotation.
Areas around Oberon have 800mm of rainfall, so the cooler temperatures in summer, plenty of rainfall in winter, so it’s good growing conditions for pine trees.
The high up-front costs of forestry plantations is a challenge. Reducing that up-front cost which is what the grant does makes it significantly more palatable to plant trees.
If you own the land and your only cost is establishment and you can get that just for minor costs, it reduces all of the hurdles for a farmer to plant a bad paddock into pines.
So you’ll have structural grade lumber for your framing of your house, you’ll have MDF, or medium density fibreboard and particleboard used for kitchen cupboards, kitchen benches.
Here with the sawmills only taking Radiata, we’re pretty keen to enter partnerships with farmers. We’ll establish the trees with you, we’ll manage and harvest on your behalf and take the wood to market. We need lots of logs.
[1:35]
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Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry logo appears on screen
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Applications are open for grant round three of the Support Plantation Establishment program.
Find out more and apply at GrantConnect.
[1:46]
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Stephen Creese Family Trust
(Duration 2 minutes 52 seconds)
Introduction
This is the transcript of a video case study produced by the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry as part of the Support Plantation Establishment Program. It was filmed with the Stephen Creese Family Trust on-site in Tasmania in 2025.
Video begins [0:00]
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The Support Plantation Establishment Program is a $73.76 million Australian Government Grant Program
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The funding supports the establishment of new long-rotation softwood and hardwood plantation forests across Australia
[0:06]
Adrian Calder: We’re in North-East Tasmania at a property called Ben Nevis Farm. So we’ve been engaged by Stephen Creese to establish 57 hectares of radiata plantation under the grants program.
Stephen Creese: The total farm would be 900 hectares, of which 200 hectares is native forest, 200 hectares production pine forestry, and the balance is being developed into pasture. Some of it is quite steep, and I was quite keen to get some forestry onto this farm as well.
Adrian Calder: The project is part of a wider planting under a carbon project.
Stephen Creese: The reason I decided to plant trees on parts of the farm was I wanted to participate in the Accu-scheme for carbon and I was also looking for something that was more of a long-term investment rather than just annual production like sheep and cattle are, but to look at forestry as a harvestable crop in the years to come.
It’s like all farming these days, no matter what you do it’s quite costly and quite labour intense, with everything obviously having to be planted by hand, so it is an expensive program.
The grant schemes, I came across them about eighteen months ago and I looked into that to see whether we would be applicable and some of the area on this farm was not applicable for the scheme, but the 53 hectares that we planted was. I decided to plant the radiata pine in consultation with Adrian. I’ve seen them grow in these regions before, they are high sequesters of carbon, so it works well for that scheme, and there is a market for the product.
Certainly other parts of Australia can have forest, I guess it depends, you need to be planting a species that will thrive in the native environment, that’s probably one of the important things. And we are lucky here, we’ve got good soil, high rainfall, it’s perfect conditions here for growing trees.
The advice I’d give to other landowners thinking about forestry on farm and applying for grants is that it’s something you should give good consideration to. I’ve always been a strong believer that all farms should have some forestry component on them, and whether that is for the Accu-scheme, it’s for sheltered stock, it’s for timber harvesting, forestry does fit in well on most farms. And I think the grant scheme is worth looking into because it’s not a cheap exercise to plant trees, you are waiting a long time to get a return, so any assistance that you can get help makes it a successful project.
[2:39]
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Applications are open for grant round three of the Support Plantation Establishment program.
Find out more and apply at GrantConnect.
[2:48]
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[2:52]
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Napier Family Trust
(Duration 2 minutes 31 seconds)
Introduction
This is the transcript of a video case study produced by the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry as part of the Support Plantation Establishment Program. It was filmed with the Napier Family Trust on-site in Tasmania in 2025.
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The Support Plantation Establishment Program is a $73.76 million Australian Government Grant Program
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The funding supports the establishment of new long-rotation softwood and hardwood plantation forests across Australia
[0:11]
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The Napier Family Trust were awarded $168,000 in funding to support the establishment of 84 hectares of new plantation forests
[0:14]
Alison Napier: We’ve currently got about five and a half thousand head of cattle on at the moment. There are certain areas of land on the farms, on the properties that aren’t suitable for grazing and pasture growth and forestry is definitely more suited to some of the areas of the property.
The advice my forester is giving me, radiata pine seeds will be much more suited to our area. But there’s considerable area that we’re planning in the future that may be up to around the 250 hectare.
With this $168,000, that money is being used for people that have heavy machinery and that have been working on the site preparing the site and getting it ready for the planting.
If you’ve got area of land that’s not suited to grazing or the particular enterprises that you’ve got on your farm but you think it might be suitable for forestry, it’s a really good opportunity. The grant process wasn’t hard. I do have a forester involved in the project who has supported me and worked with me in that grant application process and making sure that, you know, we’re organising the preparation and works that need doing for the plantation. But yeah, I think that the grant certainly makes it much, much easier to get started and to finance it.
The site will need to be sprayed, one of the sites is pretty rough so that will be done with a helicopter and then the planting of the trees will be done by a planting crew, people that do this all of the time that are very good at it, very quick, and way more efficient than we could be with our farm labour doing it.
Two income streams now. There’s obviously the timber when you harvest the plantation, but there’s also the ACCU and the benefits that we get from the carbon. So that’s also another stream of income which seems to make absolute sense to me.
[2:20]
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Applications are open for grant round three of the Support Plantation Establishment program.
Find out more and apply at GrantConnect.
[2:27]
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[2:31]
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Tasmanian Carbon Afforestation Sub-Trust
(Duration 2 minutes 37 seconds)
Introduction
This is the transcript of a video case study produced by the Department of Agriculture Fisheries and Forestry as part of the Support Plantation Establishment Program. It was filmed with the Carbon Afforestation Sub-Trust on-site in Tasmania in 2025.
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The Support Plantation Establishment Program is a $73.76 million Australian Government Grant Program
[0:05]
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The funding supports the establishment of new long-rotation softwood and hardwood plantation forests across Australia
[0:10]
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The Carbon Afforestation Sub-Trust were awarded $887,412 in funding to support the establishment of 563 hectares of new plantation forests
[0:15]
Jason Bolsh: For SFM I’m the acquisitions manager and this particular project that we’re doing, we’re making use of the federal government’s Emission Reduction Fund and the Establishment grant to achieve that end.
Talking to landowners, you can approach them about areas that are under-performing on their farms or difficult to manage.
Michael Parsons: There’s a lot of forests around us and I guess I’ve had a relationship with some foresters. They approached me to see if we had any land that I would like to lease. So far, 150 hectares.
Jason Bolsh: This area here was, as you can see from the soils, a little bit sandier. It’s closer to native forests where we have higher animal populations to control, whether it be for forestry or for farming. So it lended itself, it made it a little bit harder for agricultural purposes. So that’s where we started the conversation.
It’s a combination of carbon that we can get along the way, but you can only claim the carbon credit units up to age 15 and then it hinges off the timber value, which from around halfway through the plantation which is for this one is going to be around 17 years of age. We do a thinning operation, we get some income from that but that also is required to create if you like, or promote growth onto the better quality standards for future soil.
It is a long-term arrangement for land owners, so you’re talking anywhere from 28 to 33 years, is the range for pine plantations for instance which is what we’re in here. We tend to be on the edges of the farms or steeper banks that landowners are having issues with. That seems to be more where interests lie at this stage.
Michael Parsons: The marginal country, the money was attractive enough for us to go that way.
Jason Bolsh: For what comes up after our planting, with regard to say Bracken Fern, we can’t do anything to deter that, and to be honest the trees don’t tend to worry about Bracken anyway.
It’s kind of a safe income, or low-risk income. It’s not eating into their productive areas on their farms, so it’s a bit of a win-win for them, and also for us.
[2:26]
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Applications are open for grant round three of the Support Plantation Establishment program.
Find out more and apply at GrantConnect.
[2:33]
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[2:37]
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