Market for Change | The GREEN JOURNAL AU

The Last Stand's recent marketing campaign to inform Harvey Norman's customers where do furnitures come from. (Photo: The Last Stand)

Here’s a new anti-HN’s campaign dropped into my inbox. Conservationists unite!

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Harvey Norman stores across Australia have been visited this week as part of an innovative marketing campaign to give customers the real story of where their new native forest furniture is sourced.

The Last Stand has been campaigning to highlight the role Harvey Norman plays in the destruction of our native forests. Their native Australian furniture and flooring is sourced from high conservation value forests at risk in New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia and Tasmania. “If Harvey Norman won’t tell the truth to their customers we will” said Nicola Paris from the Last Stand. “

Conservationists across the country have visited Harvey Norman stores and done some DIY marketing, placing tags on furniture saying ‘Find out how you can win’ accompanied by a QR code which takes customers to a YouTube video which shows the destruction caused by logging our native forests for furniture.

“The myth that logging Australia’s forests for furniture ranges sold by Harvey Norman is sustainable and there is no consequence to their ongoing destruction is simply not true.

There are endangered species at risk in many of the areas Harvey Norman sources wood for its furniture. “Action is well overdue – Harvey Norman has not given any indication of changing their current practices so we are turning to creative tactics to get the facts out to their customers.” An extensive chain of custody report outlining how Harvey Norman are selling Aussie native forest destruction was published by Markets for Change and can be accessed at www.marketsforchange.org

Here’s from the email inbox: The Last Stand announced its new anti-Ta Ann Group website to discourage Japanese clients from buying Tasmania’s plywood disputedly harvested from native old-growth forests.

The banner design of the new cyber campaign

Likewise, here from the website of Market for Change which posted the list of local retailers of Tasmania’s native forests.

Tasmanian native forests' local retailers

The activists’ group has drawn a map on the extent of forest destruction in Australia– in which some of Australia’s most unique and species-rich forest habitats are still being logged including:

Tasmania’s native and old growth forests including the Tarkine, Blue Tier, Styx, Weld, and Upper Florentine Valley areas
Victoria’s Central Highlands – identified as some of the most carbon-dense forests on earth and areas in East Gippsland
New South Wales’ highly biodiverse sub-tropical and temperate native forests in the state’s north-east and south-east coastal regions
Western Australia’s native forests in the southwest of the state have been named a global biodiversity ‘hotspot’ yet logging in the state’s endemic karri, jarrah, marri, tingle, and tuart forests continue despite new threats from drought and disease.

It speculates that there are 1,287 forest-dwelling species accross Australia that are listed as vulnerable, threatened or endangered under the Australian Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBCA) 1999. They include:

The Tasmanian Wedge-Tailed eagle
Carnaby’s Black cockatoo of WA.
Victoria’s Leadbeater’s possum
The koala population of southern NSW.

These species are losing their homes

This campaign has hit the media big time, with the launch featured in the Australian – a rare event indeed! It is also a hot topic in Tasmania with regular mentions in the local press.

Our online action is doing great, heading up to 1500 emails now, and crew in Hobart have maintained a strong visual presence, letterboxing key areas and, most recently with the Ta Ann

We are continuing to work with Markets for Change and the Huon Valley Environment Centre as well as heaps of other good folks, and have also appreciated the support of the most excellent peoples at DoGooder.

So spread the message to your friends to jump on board!

For the forests,

THE LAST STAND CREW