Workforce Development

PIRSA Forestry supports workforce development opportunities for a sustainable South Australian forest and forest products sector.  We help the community appreciate the South Australian forest and forest products sector, including its vocational opportunities.

Recent activities include:

  • Expanding forestry education activities including support for schools using the Forestry matters! educational resource and website
  • Maintaining up-to-date knowledge of forest industry workforce statistics
  • Developing initiatives with industry and government to address skills shortages including career information events and publications.

Forestry matters! - a Forest Education Resource

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Forestry matters! is a comprehensive education resource designed to promote forest awareness from a uniquely South Australian perspective. It contains:

  • Lesson plans and activities for Junior Primary, Primary and Middle Years
  • 15 forest information sheets covering contemporary forest issues
  • Forestry Fun activity section
  • A forestry glossary, reference list and weblinks
  • Photographs of forests and forestry in action
  • and more.

Why teach about forestry in your classroom?

Forestry is all around us  and we use forest products every day, such as paper, tables, tissues, chairs, school desks, shelves, kitchen cabinets and many house frames are timber too.

It’s a South Australian industry and down in the South East of the state you can see each part of the value chain from nursery, planting, managing forests, harvesting to seeing the end products (e.g. tissues, kitchen cabinets) being made.

Forestry is a great theme for lessons and units, because you can cover a wide variety of themes including:

  • climate change
  • forest products and materials
  • sustainability
  • technology
  • forest certification
  • history
  • humans and forests
  • research and innovation
  • global communities
  • biodiversity corridors
  • plant and animal indentification
  • mathematics
  • and more

 
PIRSA Forestry's Education Officer can support you when applying forestry to your curriculum and provides professional development opportunities - go to our  Upcoming Events page for more information

'In Forest' Activities

Forest reserves are multiple use forests and are managed for commercial timber production, recreation and biodiversity conservation. Their diversity and location make them ideal places for educational activities.  

About 8,000 school and university students visit forest reserves each year for outdoor and forest education.

Our Education Officer can assist by providing educational material and advice for planning your forest activiites.

More information

For more information about forestry careers and workforce development, contact PIRSA Forestry's Education Officer:


Telephone: (08) 8735 1233
Facsimile:  (08) 8723 1941
E-mail: pirsaforestry@sa.gov.au