File photo of a man riding a windsurfer on a lake located on the outskirts of Hobart, in Tasmania December 21, 2012. 
 
 SYDNEY The Australian government ended its push to log World Heritage-listed forests on the southern island state of Tasmania on Sunday, after the United Nations cultural agency UNESCO issued a report calling for the area to remain protected from logging. 
 
 Australia's government in 2014 sought unsuccessfully to have parts of the Tasmanian wilderness, some one million hectares (2.47 million acres) or a fifth of the island, removed from UNESCO's World Heritage listing to enable logging. 
 
 A United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation report issued on Saturday said the whole area "should be off-limits to commercial logging in its entirety" and that it "does not consider a World Heritage property recognized for its outstanding cultural and natural values the place to experiment with commercial logging of any kind". 
 
 On Sunday both Australia's national and Tasmanian state governments adhered to the UNESCO request. 
 
 "We accept the recommendation ... that special species timber harvesting should not be allowed anywhere in the world heritage area," Tasmania's environment minister Matthew Groom said in a joint statement with national environment minister Greg Hunt. 
 
 The statement said no commercial forestry will be permitted in the World Heritage-listed area. 
 
 The Tasmanian forest, added to the World Heritage list in 1982, "constitutes one of the last expanses of temperate rainforest in the world", according to UNESCO. 
 
 Conservation groups welcomed the UNESCO report and government commitment not to log the Tasmanian wilderness. 
 
 (Reporting by Tom Westbrook; Editing by Michael Perry) ||||| Image caption Conservation groups have welcomed the decision 
 
 The Australian and Tasmanian authorities are abandoning their bid to have logging permitted in the Tasmanian Wilderness, a World Heritage site. 
 
 The decision comes after a report by the UN cultural agency Unesco said the area "should be off-limits to commercial logging in its entirety". 
 
 The Tasmanian Wilderness covers about a fifth of the island and is one of the world's last big temperate forests. 
 
 Conservation groups have welcomed the Unesco report and the logging decision. 
 
 In 2014 the Australian government asked the agency to revoke the special status of the forest to open up parts of it to logging in order to boost the island's economy, where unemployment is above the national average. 
 
 But the move - by the government of former PM Tony Abbott - attracted much opposition from environmental groups. 
 
 The Unesco report released on Saturday said the organisation "does not consider a World Heritage property recognised for its outstanding cultural and natural values the place to experiment with commercial logging of any kind". 
 
 The Tasmanian Wilderness is home to ancient forests, some of the tallest flowering plants in the world and is a stronghold for several animals that are either extinct or threatened on Australia's mainland. 
 
 Both the Australian federal and the Tasmanian state government have said they will abide by that recommendation. ||||| Norway has become the first country in the world to commit to zero deforestation. 
 
 The Norwegian parliament pledged the government’s public procurement policy will become deforestation-free after a committee of MPs recommended imposing regulations to ensure the state did "not contribute to deforestation of the rainforest". 
 
 Norway funds forest conservation projects worldwide and also supports human rights programmes for forest communities. 
 
 Nils Hermann Ranum, the head of Policy and Campaign at Rainforest Foundation Norway, said in a statement: “This is an important victory in the fight to protect the rainforest. Over the last few years, a number of companies have committed to cease the procurement of goods that can be linked to destruction of the rainforest. 
 
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 “Until now, this has not been matched by similar commitments from governments. Thus, it is highly positive that the Norwegian state is now following suit and making the same demands when it comes to public procurements”. 
 
 The Rainforest Foundation Norway has campaigned for years to secure a zero deforestation commitment from the Norwegian government. 
 
 The MPs' committee also called for the government to protect biodiversity by developing a separate policy and through investments made by Norges Bank Investment Management. 
 
 Shape Created with Sketch. In pictures: Biggest threats to the rainforests Show all 10 left Created with Sketch. right Created with Sketch. Shape Created with Sketch. In pictures: Biggest threats to the rainforests 1/10 Borneo Destruction of the rainforest, deforestation in Borneo 2/10 Brazil Aerial view af an area devastated by clandestine gold mining in the Jamanxim National Forest, state of Para. With 1,3 million hectares, the Jamanxim National Forest is a microsm that replicates what happens in the Amazon, where thousands of hectares of land are prey of illegal woodcutters, stock breeders and gold miners 3/10 Amazon rainforest Intensive logging makes rainforest fires more likely as the Earth warms Rex 4/10 Peru Miners known as "Maraqueros" ready a rustic type of hydraulic jet known locally as a "Chupadera," after hauling the device about 16-meters deep into a crater at a gold mine process in La Pampa in Peru's Madre de Dios region. A new threat now looms for the estimated 20,000 wildcat miners who toil in huge scar of denuded rainforest known as La Pampa 5/10 Peru A rope hangs around the trunk of a tree at a illegal gold mining process in La Pampa in Peru's Madre de Dios region. An estimated 20,000 miners toil in this malarial expanse of denuded rainforest known as La Pampa 6/10 Amazon rainforest The extent of the environmental damage in the Amazon rainforest afp/getty images 7/10 Indonesia Destruction remains from tropical rainforest in Kuala Cenaku in Riau Province, Sumatra. Norway entered a partnership with Indonesia to support Indonesia's efforts to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation of forests and peat lands. The business of pulp, palm oil and wood are causing the deforestation of Sumatra, the largest island owned by Indonesia, and is contributing global climate change to the extinction of many of the world's rare species 8/10 Malaysia An area that has been cleared of rainforest to make way for a palm oil plantation in Sabah, Malaysia CORBIS 9/10 Indonesia Regenerated palm oil trees are seen growing on the site of destroyed tropical rainforest in Kuala Cenaku GETTY IMAGES 10/10 Brazil Brazil launched the Amazon Fund, aimed at protecting the rainforest so vital to the world's climate, and at combating climate change. In December 2008 Brazil launched a national climate change plan which proposed to cut the country's deforestation rate in half by 2018 Getty Images 1/10 Borneo Destruction of the rainforest, deforestation in Borneo 2/10 Brazil Aerial view af an area devastated by clandestine gold mining in the Jamanxim National Forest, state of Para. With 1,3 million hectares, the Jamanxim National Forest is a microsm that replicates what happens in the Amazon, where thousands of hectares of land are prey of illegal woodcutters, stock breeders and gold miners 3/10 Amazon rainforest Intensive logging makes rainforest fires more likely as the Earth warms Rex 4/10 Peru Miners known as "Maraqueros" ready a rustic type of hydraulic jet known locally as a "Chupadera," after hauling the device about 16-meters deep into a crater at a gold mine process in La Pampa in Peru's Madre de Dios region. A new threat now looms for the estimated 20,000 wildcat miners who toil in huge scar of denuded rainforest known as La Pampa 5/10 Peru A rope hangs around the trunk of a tree at a illegal gold mining process in La Pampa in Peru's Madre de Dios region. An estimated 20,000 miners toil in this malarial expanse of denuded rainforest known as La Pampa 6/10 Amazon rainforest The extent of the environmental damage in the Amazon rainforest afp/getty images 7/10 Indonesia Destruction remains from tropical rainforest in Kuala Cenaku in Riau Province, Sumatra. Norway entered a partnership with Indonesia to support Indonesia's efforts to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation of forests and peat lands. The business of pulp, palm oil and wood are causing the deforestation of Sumatra, the largest island owned by Indonesia, and is contributing global climate change to the extinction of many of the world's rare species 8/10 Malaysia An area that has been cleared of rainforest to make way for a palm oil plantation in Sabah, Malaysia CORBIS 9/10 Indonesia Regenerated palm oil trees are seen growing on the site of destroyed tropical rainforest in Kuala Cenaku GETTY IMAGES 10/10 Brazil Brazil launched the Amazon Fund, aimed at protecting the rainforest so vital to the world's climate, and at combating climate change. In December 2008 Brazil launched a national climate change plan which proposed to cut the country's deforestation rate in half by 2018 Getty Images 
 
 In 2014 Norway made a joint declaration with Germany and the UK at a UN climate summit in New York, pledging to “promote national commitments that encourage deforestation-free supply chains, including through public procurement policies to sustainably source commodities such as palm oil, soy, beef and timber". 
 
 The production of beef, palm oil, soy and wood products in seven countries with high deforestation rates was responsible for 40 per cent of total tropical deforestation and 44 per cent of associated carbon emissions between 2000 and 2011, according to Climate Action.
– Australia's plan to log "one of the last expanses of temperate rainforest in the world" has fizzled to the acclaim of conservationists the world over. Two years after requesting that logging be allowed in parts of the Tasmanian Wilderness to boost the local economy, the country received a recommendation from UN cultural agency UNESCO on Saturday. The agency says it "does not consider a World Heritage property recognized for its outstanding cultural and natural values the place to experiment with commercial logging" and the area—which covers 1 million hectares, or about 20% of Tasmania, per the BBC and Reuters—"should be off-limits to commercial logging in its entirety." UNESCO also calls for a "master plan" for tourism activities, noting Australia's hopes of allowing cruise ships, planes, and helicopters to land on the island "created room for interpretation and even suspicions," per the Guardian. "The decision of the United Nations to prohibit limited special species harvesting in the Tasmanian Wilderness world heritage area is very disappointing," says the Tasmanian minister for forestry. "However, it would be grossly irresponsible for any government to defy such a ruling, and we will abide by it." The BBC reports the World Heritage site is home to extinct and threatened animals, ancient trees, and "some of the tallest flowering plants in the world."