A landmark judgment that enforced federal environment laws over logging operations has been overturned in the Federal Court. State-owned forestry agency VicForests has won its appeal against last year’s landmark judgment which halted logging operations in native forests in Victoria’s Central Highlands. The Federal Court in May ruled in favour of local environment group Friends of Leadbeater’s Possum, which argued VicForests had breached the federal Environment Protection Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act when it logged forest coupes in the Central Highlands region. Until then, an effective exemption from federal laws had been applied to logging undertaken in areas that are covered by Regional Forestry Agreements (RFA). …But on Monday the Federal Court upheld VicForests’ appeal against Justice Mortimer’s judgment. They found that if logging is conducted within an RFA zone it is exempt from federal law – even if it breaches state laws and the RFA.