SO WHAT IS IT ABOUT THIS JARRAH FOREST IN WA?
A quick-ish run down on a complex issue.
The strip mining of the Northern Jarrah Forest has become a national political issue, and it’s deeply personal to most of us from the south west of WA. Before the fences went up to hide the mining activity, I grew up camping in that forest. Our first camp site was down on the river at Myra, which has now been destroyed as the cancer of the strip mining has spread through the forest and is causing an uproar in the local community.
For those who are new to the issue, let’s get into some background - what’s so special about this forest, what are the threats to its survival, and what can we do about it?
(KINGSLEY DIXON INTERVIEW: SCROLL TO END)
WHAT MAKES THE NORTHERN JARRAH FOREST SPECIAL
1. There’s only one.
There’s only one Northern Jarrah Forest on Earth. It’s completely unique in it’s species and ecosystem. And once it is gone it cannot be replaced.
Over 800 plant species live there—that’s more than three-quarters of all the flora of the British Isles, packed into southwest Australia. Recently, botanists found two new orchid species that had never been recorded by Western science.
The forest is home to at least 235 vertebrate species, while invertebrate diversity is thought to be in the tens of thousands — including countless species that have never been scientifically described or named. Over 80% of the 8,000-plus species found across the South West Global Biodiversity Hotspot, are endemic — that means they are found nowhere else on Earth. Every year, more new species are discovered, including everything from trapdoor spiders to orchids.
2. It’s part of who we are as West Australians.
For the Nyoongar people of Western Australia, the jarrah forest is sacred country. The forest contains dreaming tracks, ceremonial grounds, birthing places, ochre pits. The totem animals—the black cockatoos, the numbat—aren’t just wildlife, they’re ancestors and teachers. They’re part of the law and the land was never ceded.
People of the colony are connected to the forest too. My family is 6th generation in the area between Bridgetown and Collie. Families including mine have camped and fished in this forest for generations. And visitors come from all over the world to walk the Bibbulmun Track through it. It’s literally famous.
3. It’s essential to Western Australia’s water system.
The Darling Range, where the Northern Jarrah Forest is located, is a water catchment. Perth’s drinking water comes from here, there’s a water table under the forest itself. And, there’s something bigger: rainfall itself depends on the forest. Rainfall in the southwest has dropped more than 20% since the 1970s. Tree loss is tightly linked to declining rainfall, which in turn reduces the water table. Continuing to have trees in the NJF will secure our water supply for the future.
4. It’s home to our friends.
The Numbat lives in the NJF. The state emblem of WA that only has 1,000 surviving adults in the wild. The Forest Red-tailed Black Cockatoo—a harbinger of rain, a spiritual messenger bird and totem animal —lives in the NJF. It’s cousin the Baudin’s Black Cockatoo is endangered and this is its only habitat. Just 2,000 Baudin’s remain on Earth. They have no other home but this forest.
All of the black cockatoos, and owls, need old trees with hollows to nest in. Trees that are 200–300 years old and are suddenly very rare in the south west.
The forest is also home to the only mainland quokkas in Australia, the critically endangered western ringtail possum, the chuditch, the western quoll, the southern brown bandicoot, the woylie — at least 235 vertebrate species in total, with tens of thousands of invertebrate species, many still unnamed. All of them dependent on a healthy forest with large connected areas to survive.
5. It’s a Living History.
Trees in this forest are 100–300 years old, and need to be this old so that breeding hollows form for the birds and create the conditions for healthy understory. Some trees predate European colonisation and most of them predate the current political leadership. Grass trees (balga) are over a century old and the cycads are another slow-growing, long-lived structural species. These aren’t just timber and bush to be cleared for progress. They’re the architecture of an ancient ecosystem which was here long before colonisation and keeps the entire south west in ecological balance.
The NJF ecosystem is essential to the future of life in Western Australia.
SO WHAT ARE THE THREATS TO THE NJF?
1. The NJF has become a political pawn.
Last September, over 59,000 West Australians submitted to the EPA with the overwhelming majority supporting an end to strip mining the forest and supporting the ecosystem of the South West of WA. This caused a rub - whereby it could be political suicide for the WA Labor party to allow the strip mining to continue under the current conditions. It also caused ALCOA to use delay tactics in their response to this overwhelming and unprecedented number of submissions while another solution could be negotiated behind the scenes.
Come forward to February 2026 and the Northern Jarrah Forest has become national news due to announcements of $55M in fines to ALCOA by the federal environment minister the Hon. Murray Watt for destruction of endangered species habitat. Those fines amount to about a day or two of revenue for the Aluminium Company of America, who are the major strip mining company operating in the forest. I have it on good authority from a government source that the only reason that those fines were announced is because there was a data leak detailing the breaches in their agreements, that is showing ALCOA destroying critical habitat. The data leak caused a scramble and this sudden national announcement of a fine that came out of nowhere.
In addition, the Aluminium Company of America have been granted an exemption to keep strip mining on the basis of the critical minerals deal our PM signed last October with the United States. This has created a layer of further complexity following the overwhelming local support to end strip mining in the forest and create a holistic assessment of what’s happening there, as ALCOA are not the only company operating.
The Northern Jarrah Forest is facing multiple threats from political manoeuvres and needs our help.
Activity in the Northern Jarrah Forest needs to halt until a holistic plan is developed to both manage the commitments for minerals, and ensure the future health of the forest.
2. Clearing has sped up.
Sixty years ago when the first agreement was signed to commence strip mining, Alcoa said they’d clear 10 hectares a year—never more than 400. Today they’re clearing 600–1,200 hectares annually. Over 300 square kilometres already gone. Let that sink in.
Over 300 square kilometres already gone. The forest is on its knees.
ALCOA have the proposal for expansion of their mining in with the EPA now, which caused the mass comment. And recently South 32, another mining company operating in the area, were approved an extension against the recommendation of all scientists involved both as consultants and in house at the company. This reached international news and caused the NJF to be identified by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as one of a handful of Australian ecosystems most at risk — the IPCC stated it was “highly confident” the ecosystem would “transition” or “collapse” as a result of a hotter and drier climate. As Kingsley Dixon says: ‘[This mining is] the largest impacts of any biodiversity hotspot in the largest remaining and most biodiverse temperate forest on Earth. The science is definitive. This ecosystem took 80 million years to evolve. You can’t rehabilitate that. [And] if you take away bauxite, you can’t put back a Jarrah forest.’
We are not saying that we need to end all mining everywhere. We are saying we need to end strip mining of the Northern Jarrah Forest.
The NJF is a one-of-a-kind biodiversity hotspot that is close to extinction due to strip mining. The profits of the Aluminium Company of America, the bauxite, and the gallium, can and need to come from somewhere else.
3. Health risks for West Australians are real and rising.
When we used to bush walk through the NJF we would drink from the streams in winter. That’s no longer possible for two reasons - one, there’s less rainfall and therefore less streams and two, PFAS forever chemicals have contaminated the soil and filtered into the water table due to the strip mining.
Perth’s drinking water comes from Serpentine Dam, right where ALCOA are mining and have a national interest exemption currently to expand operations. Contamination of the dam due to the strip mining by ALCOA is deemed “certain” by the Water Corporation of WA. And yet the federal government has approved continued activity.
In Pinjarra, the town living next to Alcoa’s refinery operations, instances of adverse health in 2021 were significantly elevated compared to WA averages: asthma at 9.8% (vs 7.3% statewide), heart disease at 5.6% (vs 3.6%), and cancer at 4.3% (vs 2.7%). This looks like a pattern and needs further investigation.
The 4,000 jobs ALCOA provide to the state are risking the health of WA’s people and water systems.
4. Rehabilitation of strip mined areas has failed after 60 years.
After six decades of mining and restoration attempts, not a single hectare has been formally accepted by the government as “completed rehabilitation.”
Independent science (Campbell et al., 2024) using international restoration standards found Alcoa’s rehabilitation scores 2 stars out of 5—meaning it does not restore the forest, does not improve over time, and does not show improvement from adaptive management.
Key species are permanently absent. Plant diversity drops over time, not increases. The understory layer that defines the Jarrah Forest—grass trees, cycads, sedges—is essentially gone from restored areas and won’t return. Some of these species take centuries to grow.
Botany Professor Kingsley Dixon explains: ‘And what are [the cockatoos] going to eat? The tree hollows last maximum six years. Are the trees that Alcoa plant in their plantations after mining going to reach 200 and 300 years old to make the hollow [for breeding]? Because you’ve got to be that old to get a hollow-bearing tree.’
5. The health of the forest is declining due to drying and fire.
Rainfall in the southwest has dropped 20% since the 1970s due to the massive land clearing from agriculture, logging and mining combined. Tree loss is linked to declining rainfall—a feedback loop we can’t reverse. As we clear more forest in a drying climate, we reduce the water available to the state. Fire risk is increasing and drying is exaggerated by controlled burning. Rehabilitation areas have three times the risk of canopy drought-death compared to natural forest, and double the wildfire risk to surrounding areas up to 1.5 kilometres away.
The Northern Jarrah Forest is on its knees. We are at risk of losing untold biodiversity, a major carbon sink and key rainfall generator for the south west region.
THE BOTTOM LINE
The Northern Jarrah Forest is irreplaceable. It’s biologically unique. It’s culturally sacred. It’s critical to Perth’s drinking water supply and the southwest’s rainfall. It’s home to species found nowhere else on Earth. And rehabilitation—the justification used to approve continued mining—has been scientifically proven not to work. This is not about stopping all mining everywhere. It’s about stopping mining here. Not this forest. Not anymore.
There are other places to get aluminium. There’s only one Jarrah Forest.
WHAT CAN I DO?
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Watch the full interview with Professor Kingsley Dixon below, he’s an expert on this issue.
Engage everyone around you, you’d be surprised how many people don’t know about this issue. Talk about it. At the dinner table. At work. With your kids’ teachers. With your local member. The government is watching the level of public concern. Numbers matter.
Attend the National March for Forests—Sunday, March 22, 2026. And bring a friend! Every capital city. The government needs to see numbers. They need to know that people care about this forest more than they care about cheap aluminium. As Professor Dixon says: ‘The political process wants to hear that the people believe that it is time for this to stop.’ See you there!
- ZRW