“Serial Offender” or Systemic Failure?

How NSW’s Forestry Corporation Has Accumulated Millions in Environmental Fines and Charges

SYDNEY, NSW — A government-owned forestry agency is back in the headlines — not for sustainable forest management, but for a mounting ledger of fines, prosecutions and environmental enforcement actions that have attracted criticism from scientists, former judges and community groups alike.

This week the NSW Environment Protection Authority (EPA) slapped two new penalty notices totalling $60,000 on the Forestry Corporation of NSW (FCNSW) over sediment flowing into Dooga Creek at Mogo State Forest, after machinery crossing works breached best-practice erosion controls and failed to comply with a clean-up notice.

But that latest penalty is far from the whole story. Over the past half-decade, FCNSW has faced a significant and growing enforcement burden, with figures that add up to well over a million dollars in fines, costs and penalties, and dozens of investigations and prosecutions that critics say reveal deeper systemic issues.

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📊 Fines, Convictions and Prosecutions (Selected Cases)

Major Court Fines & Penalties

• $360,000 (2024) — Largest single fine to date, after FCNSW pleaded guilty in the Land and Environment Court for breaching post-bushfire forestry conditions in Yambulla State Forest, cutting 53 trees in a designated recovery area.
• $45,000 (2024) — Two separate fines for habitat tree removal in Nadgee and slope breaches in Bagawa State Forest.
• $60,000 (2026) — Latest EPA penalty notices for water pollution and failure to comply with clean-up notices at Mogo State Forest.

Patterns of Smaller Fines (via independent tracking)

• $230,000 (2022) — Fine in Dampier State Forest for breaching exclusion zones near Bodalla, part of more than $500,000 in fines in a single June enforcement period.
• $15,000–$45,000 range across multiple earlier cases involving habitat breaches, hollow-bearing tree removals, and failure to protect exclusion zones in forests including Mogo, Wild Cattle Creek, Ballengarra and others.

Ongoing Legal Actions

• 29 Charges Filed (2025) — EPA has commenced legal proceedings with 29 charges against FCNSW for alleged breaches of forestry and biodiversity laws in Tallaganda State Forest — a case that could see five- or six-figure penalties once adjudicated.

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📌 Total Enforcement Footprint (2020–2026)

According to independent trackers and public enforcement records:

• 31 official warnings,
• 13 penalty notices,
• 5 stop-work orders,
• 8 prosecutions — many with convictions and court-ordered fines.

Community watchdogs estimate that fines, legal costs and penalties attributable to FCNSW enforcement actions since the 2019/20 bushfires and beyond exceed $1.7 million — and that figure grows each time the EPA or Land and Environment Court takes action.

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📢 Political, Scientific and Community Backlash

The tally is not just a spreadsheet exercise — it has fuelled sharp criticism from across the environmental spectrum:

• Former NSW magistrate Prof. David Heilpern and ecologist Prof. David Lindenmayer have publicly compared FCNSW’s record to that of a “criminal organisation”, citing repeated convictions as evidence of systemic failure rather than sporadic missteps.
• Environmental groups argue that most prosecutions and regulatory actions were triggered by citizen reporting, not internal compliance checks, suggesting that enforcement is reactive rather than preventative.
• Conservation advocates highlight the ongoing Tallaganda prosecution as potentially historic — with maximum penalties “in the millions” if charges are proven — reflecting alleged habitat destruction for the endangered southern greater glider.

Critics have called on the NSW Government to rethink native forest logging entirely, asserting that taxpayers — not timber buyers — are shouldering the costs of breaches and legal consequences.

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🌲 Forestry Corporation’s Response

In its defence, FCNSW acknowledges the enforcement actions but consistently frames breaches as human error, mapping failures or isolated compliance issues, not evidence of systemic disregard for environmental laws. The corporation also highlights its broader role in managing millions of hectares of state forests and asserts that most operations comply with regulatory requirements.

The Minns government — which oversees FCNSW’s shareholder ministers — has so far declined to commit to fundamental reforms, even as debate intensifies over native forest logging’s environmental and economic sustainability.

📌 Why It Matters

The growing ledger of penalties and charges against FCNSW isn’t just about numbers — it tells a story of tension between conservation laws, state forest management, and community expectations for biodiversity protection in a climate-sensitive era.

As the Tallaganda case unfolds and penalty tallies continue to rise, policymakers, scientists and citizens alike are asking whether the current model of native forest logging and enforcement is fit for purpose in 2026 — or whether a structural overhaul, or even a phase-out of native harvesting, is overdue.

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