One of the biggest policy changes needed in B.C. is to forestry policy.
B.C. policy for the last 50 years has resulted in a rapid clear-cutting of a large part of our forests even as all the research indicates that:
1. Within a 60-80 year time span, only 20-30 per cent of forests can be cut in any one area without seriously harming the hydrological cycle. On this basis, most so-called commercial forests throughout B.C. have been severely over-cut making a mockery of the concept of Annual Allowable Cut. A damaged hydrological cycle results in increased risk of droughts, floods, landslides and forest fires That is what we are now experiencing, exacerbated of course by climate change.
2. Clear-cutting directly results in increased risk of forest fires up to 30 years after the clear cut, even if the area is replanted. It also damages the soil and its bacteria and fungi, through heavy machinery compaction and subsequent erosion, impeding recovery of the forest. Large scale clear cuts make natural regeneration almost impossible on a human time scale. Clear cuts are just as damaging to forest recovery after beetle infestation or forest fires. So-called salvage logging impedes the natural recovery of these forests.
3. Re-planting forests is mostly a form of green-washing in that it gives forestry companies cover for the forest damage they do. Replanted forests are plantations and in many ways do not become forests, being impoverished in soil biological activity, tree and understory plant species, insects and other animals. In other words, it diminishes bio-diversity and leads to species extinction.
4. There are much better ways of harvesting that do not damage the forests. They create more and more diverse jobs. The only downside is that they reduce the profits of large forest corporations, who have successfully fought against these changes for decades.
5. Due to the extent of logging, and the increase in forest fires partially due to the logging, since about 2003 BC forests have gone from being a carbon sink to the a source of carbon emissions. In big fire years including 2017, 2018, 2021, 2023, and 2024, GHG emissions from our forests are dwarfing the emissions from all sources reported by the B.C. government. The faster we cut back on, and change the way we carry out logging, the faster we will get these emissions back under control.
A major grassroots effort has now been launched, called The Power of Forests: Protecting Communities and Nature with a New Forest Act, and undertaken by the newly formed Boundary Forest Watershed Stewardship Society.
To find out more, go to: https://boundaryforest.org/problem-solution/
Eli Pivnick,
member of Climate Action Now! North Okanagan