Aunty Contributes To The Angst

The ABC is held up by many as the gold standard of journalism in Australia with millions of Australians having the unwavering belief that anything out of the mouth of Aunty must be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.  But in reality, is ABC reporting on forestry issues in Tasmania objective, factual journalism, or are the articles simply post-truth opinion pieces from the ideologically aligned "journalists"?

In the interests of objective journalism and full disclosure, should journalists have to alert the reader to any personal affiliations to, or sympathies towards organisations that they are ideologically aligned to?  One would certainly think so.

According to the ABC editorial policy on accuracy,

The ABC has a statutory duty to ensure that the gathering and presentation of news and information is accurate according to the recognised standards of objective journalism. Credibility depends heavily on factual accuracy;  and

The ABC has a requirement to;

2.1 Make reasonable efforts to ensure that material facts are accurate and presented in context.

2.2 Do not present factual content in a way that will materially mislead the audience. In some cases, this may require appropriate labels or other explanatory information.

In light of these "standards", it is worth reviewing some recent ABC news articles on Tasmanian forestry.

The first article we'll look at was not news at all but a "story" created by a journalist. 

The article author discovered that two small areas of Future Potential Production Forest (FPPF) land were located near the new tourism attraction the Three Capes Track and seized upon this "fact" and then went out to source comment about logging in these areas and the potential impact on tourism.

This "newsworthy" discovery initially led to an audio story which was aired on ABC's The World Today program the day before the online news article.

The original online article (which has now been modified) showed a screenshot from the Tasmanian Government's List Map service similar to the one pictured below.

Screen shot of the Tasman Peninsula from Tasmanian government List Map service. 

FPPF areas are marked with diagonal lines.

 



The story only listed the source of the picture as "supplied" when it was clearly just a screenshot from the journalist's computer. At least the caption could have read "supplied by the author from the Tasmanian List Map Service".  By stating that the image was "supplied" it gives the readers an impression that it was supplied by someone outside of the ABC in an attempt to give the image credibility.

The article then went on to interview tourism operators and anti-forestry campaigners with a clear thread that timber harvesting in these areas would have a dire impact on tourism operations - not only in the Three Capes area but Statewide.

To the unsuspecting reader, this is a story about a government-inspired, rapacious forest industry pushing into national parks and pristine wilderness areas.

Following a complaint to the ABC that the article was intentionally misleading and not in accordance with their editorial policy on accuracy, the article was changed and used the picture below.  A link to a larger picture on the ABC website is here.   As you can see, by using satellite imagery as opposed to a topographic map background, it is quite evident that the areas in question are surrounded by a mosaic of harvesting operations and re-growth forests - some only a few hundred metres away from where thousands of tourists have walked the Three Capes Track already without any knowledge of the forestry operations or any impact on tourism.

The picture caption was also changed from "supplied" to Three Capes area, showing track (red), FPPF and historically logged clearings (Supplied: Tasmanian Government)

Certainly paints a different picture.

The article also fails to mention a number of critical points, namely;

1.   That the Three Capes Track is contained wholly within the Tasman National Park and under state legislation, no timber harvesting can occur within national parks.

2.   The FPPF land cannot be accessed for timber harvesting under state legislation until at least 2020.

3.   Not all the FPPF land will be used for timber harvesting as a number of  FPPF areas do not have harvestable timber in them.

4.   Prior to 2013, these areas of FPPF land were largely state forests available for timber harvesting.

5.   Thousands of people have walked the track to date and not one person has raised the issue of adjacent forestry operations.  According to this article,  94 per cent of walkers rated the walk as one of the best things they had done in their life or the past 12 months.

So in the end,  did this "news" story comply with the ABC's editorial policy on accuracy, or was it a thinly veiled attempt to mislead an unknowing public into an anti-forestry position? 

I'll let you decide.