Author Archives: fobif

Here’s a brief follow up to our very modest victory over moronic TV advertising last week. The Ad Standards community panel found that that the Suzuki ad depicted unsafe driving in a positive light: ‘the Panel considered that the depiction … Continue reading →

FOBIF’s complaint to Ad standards, the body supervising the voluntary code of practice of the car industry, about Suzuki’s ridiculous ‘for fun’s sake’ TV commercial, has been upheld. Suzuki went to great lengths to defend its commercial. Among other things … Continue reading →

Mount Alexander Shire hosted a consultation with interested citizens last week to consider a management plan for the Botanical Gardens flora and fauna reserve. The plan would be implemented in tandem with the gardens conservation management plan, which was open … Continue reading →

What does the phrase ‘extensive vegetation modification’ mean? Answer: in Heritage speak, it’s a reference to what happened to our landscape during the gold rush. It’s code for: trashed landscapes, ruined waterways, denuded forest lands. Why do heritage documents use … Continue reading →

The new plan does make some advances on the old on the twin questions of environmental damage and Aboriginal dispossession. For a start, it explicitly tries to incorporate a role for indigenous questions in park interpretation: ‘In 2013 settlement of … Continue reading →

VEAC has released its final recommendations on the Central West forest. The full report with the executive summary and related documents can be found here. The final recommendations take account of responses to the draft, issued last year: but the … Continue reading →

Here’s a quote from the Australian National Outlook study released by the CSIRO last week: ‘While water use is projected to double by 2050, this growth can be met while enhancing urban water security and avoiding increased environmental pressures through increased … Continue reading →

It has a pretty name, and a pretty flower—after all, it was introduced into this country as a garden plant. Now it’s one of the worst invasive weeds in the country, a menace to the environment and agriculture. You guessed … Continue reading →

How long should we plan for? An interesting hint can be found in the May issue of the newsletter of the Australian Forest History Society, in a story by Roger Underwood, about New College Oxford, founded in 1379: ‘The chapel … Continue reading →