The magnificent old-growth forests in British Columbia are vital to support many unique endangered species, First Nations cultures, B.C.’s multi-billion-dollar tourism industry, and to provide clean water for communities and wild salmon. In addition, they store more carbon per hectare than even tropical forests do.
Unfortunately, they are being logged at a breakneck speed - old-growth logging is not a rare or isolated activity in BC, but rather is the norm across vast regions of the province - despite the fact that well over 90% of the old-growth forests with the largest trees have already been logged, and that second-growth forests now dominate most of the province and can be sustainably logged.
The unique features of old-growth temperate rainforests take centuries to develop — in a province where the forests are re-logged every 60 to 80 years, never to become old-growth again. As a result, old-growth forests are not a renewable resource under B.C.’s system of forestry and are not replicated by planting trees.
Funding from the BC government is vital to protect old-growth forests in British Columbia - without it, there is simply no chance to systematically protect the most endangered old-growth forests across the province.
The federal government has allocated $2.3 billion to expand the protected areas system across Canada. BC’s share is about $300 million, and about $50 million has been committed by the federal government to protect old-growth forests in BC.
NOW the onus is on the BC government to fund the protection of old-growth forests in BC with at least $300 million (about $600 million is needed at a minimum) needed to support Indigenous old-growth protection efforts and to buy and protect private lands. In particular, funding is needed immediately to help offset the lost revenues of First Nations should they support old-growth logging deferrals in areas where they have timber interests.
In addition, the province will have to set aside other funding to compensate major logging companies, to support forestry workers transition plans, and to ensure the forest industry retools and transitions to a second-growth forest industry on the BC coast.
The BC government is currently developing new policies that will determine the fate of BC’s endangered old-growth forests, after releasing the Old-Growth Strategic Review panel’s (the province’s appointed public consultation team) recommendations in September of 2020 on managing BC’s old-growth forests.
The Panel’s recommendations if fully implemented would ultimately result in the protection of all endangered old-growth forest types in BC. While the BC government has committed in theory to implementing all of the 14 panel’s recommendations, they are late in implementing the critical deferrals and have not committed to a critical funding to enable old-growth forest protection on a sufficient scale.
It would be like a government declaring their support for education and health care - just not the funding. This, of course, would be a hollow promise.
In British Columbia, virtually all old-growth forests are on the unceded territories of diverse First Nations, and successive court rulings have affirmed that First Nations consent is vital to establish any major land use changes, including establishing new protected areas. Across BC, many First Nations have conservation and protected areas plans, while at the same time over the past 15 years successive provincial governments have worked to foster an economic dependency on old-growth logging (in the form of revenue-sharing, joint venture, employment, and tenure agreements in contentious old-growth forests) for First Nations across much of BC.
To protect old-growth forests, the provincial government must ensure the needed funding to support First Nations efforts to establish new Indigenous Protected Areas and land use plans. Financing is needed to ensure an equivalent economic alternative to old-growth logging in the form of sustainable economic development like cultural and eco-tourism, clean energy, sustainable seafood, value-added second-growth forestry, and non-timber forest products industries in First Nations communities, linked to the protection of ancient forests, as well as for land use planning, community engagement, and management and stewardship programs such as Indigenous Guardians programs.
In addition, an annual, dedicated land acquisition fund is needed to purchase and protect private lands with old-growth forests and endangered ecosystems, such as those in the extremely endangered Coastal Douglas-fir and very dry Coastal Western Hemlock zones on Vancouver Island.
Your voice can help ensure the critical funding and policies are in place to make both the near-term deferrals and long-term protection happen!
Please SEND a MESSAGE to the BC Government to Finance the Protection of Old-Growth Forests:
YOUR MESSAGE WILL BE SENT TO: BC Premier David Eby, Minister of Finance Selina Robinson, Minister of the Environment and Climate Change George Heyman, Minister of Forests Katrine Conroy, Minister of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation Murray Rankin, Minister of Tourism Lisa Beare, Minister of Land, Water and Resource Stewardship Josie Osborne, Minister of Jobs Ravi Kahlon, Minister of Municipal Affairs Nathan Cullen, BC Green Party leader Sonia Furstenau, Green Party MLA Adam Olsen, BC Opposition Leader Kevin Falcon, and your own MLA if you live in BC. Also Federal Minister of Environment and Climate Change Steven Guilbeault, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Green Party Leader MP Elizabeth May, NDP MP Jagmeet Singh, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, and your Federal MP.
More Important Information about Financing First Nations Protected Areas and Logging Deferrals:
See a recent media release about this here.
Along with placing moratoria on the high productivity and most endangered old-growth forests in BC, the Old-Growth Strategic Review panel recommended that the BC government “Establish mechanisms for local Indigenous groups to meet provincial targets and standards for biodiversity protection, and ecosystem representation” and “Establish support programs for Indigenous groups to build their land/forest management expertise and capacity.” These recommendations surely would entail significant financial support for First Nations land use plans and protected areas, and must be adopted by the province while they consult with First Nations on the Panel about new old-growth policies.
Provincial funding to protect old-growth forests can be augmented by funding from the federal government and conservation organizations to support Indigenous Protected Areas and land use plans that protect old-growth forests - such as the $120 million in funding - $60 million from environmental groups, $30 million from the federal government, and $30 million from the province used to help protect the Great Bear Rainforest on BC’s Central and North Coast. Federal and provincial funding are vital, however, as the financial capacity of government is far greater than those of non-profit organizations.
The federal government is currently funding of Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas (IPCA’s) through the Canada Nature Fund in order to meet the national commitment to protect 25% of Canada’s terrestrial and freshwater area by 2025 and 30% by 2030. BC currently sits at about 15% protection, with a disproportionate amount in alpine and subalpine zones. BC is expected to commit to these federal targets and must do its fair share of financing to make it happen – including financing the protection of old-growth forests.
So far, the BC government has enacted logging deferrals for two years in 9 tracts of old-growth forests in BC totalling 200,000 hectares - of which only 3,800 hectares consist of previous unprotected, high productivity old-growth forests with the forest giants. This is highly inadequate. Immediate logging deferrals on 415,000 hectares of high productivity old-growth forests are needed, along with tens of thousands of additional hectares of the most endangered and most intact old-growth ecosystems.
Read an important article in The Narwhal about the critical financing needed to protect BC’s old-growth forests.
And read a recent joint letter from the Union of BC Indian Chiefs (UBCIC) and BC’s main old-growth protection organizations including the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance calling on the BC government to finance the protection of old-growth forests here.
More Background Info About BC’s Old-Growth Forests
But their large-scale industrial clearcutting continues, with about 55,000 hectares of old-growth forests – an area the size of about 5 cities of Vancouver – being logged every year in BC. On Vancouver Island already 80% of the productive old-growth forests have been logged, while a recent scientific study found that only 3% of the remaining old-growth forests in BC consist of high productivity (sites that grow the largest trees) old-growth forests with the classic forest giants.
With so little left, to continue logging the last giants is akin to slaughtering the last herds of elephants or harpooning the last great whales.
Old-growth logging is both unnecessary and unethical across most of BC, given that second-growth forests dominate more than 80 per cent of B.C.’s productive forest lands and can be sustainably logged. Indeed, the rest of the western world is focused on logging 50 to 100 year old second- or third-growth trees. B.C. is one of the very last jurisdictions on earth that still condones and supports the large-scale logging of 500 and 1000-year-old trees.
This will not last. The transition to an exclusively second-growth forest industry in B.C. is inevitable, when the last of the unprotected old-growth stands are logged. Conservationists are just advocating that the governments implement the incentives and regulations to complete this second-growth transition now, before the last endangered old-growth stands are gone.
The first major, province-wide analysis on the status of old-growth forests in BC has been released by an independent science team - and the results are dire.
Read the full, independent research from Dr. Rachel Holt, Dr. Karen Price, and Dave Daust at Veridian Ecological.
Key points of the report include:
1. There is now a miniscule fraction (2.7%) of the original high productivity old-growth forests in BC where the biggest trees grow (and with the greatest biodiversity levels and most endangered species).
2. The province's old-growth protection levels are grossly inadequate, jeopardizing forest ecosystems across most of BC (ie. placing them at "high risk" of species loss and losing ecological integrity) due to their insufficient scale of protection.
3. BC's accounting system for how much old-growth remains lacks critical distinctions in forest productivity (thus opting to protect sites with small trees instead of big trees) and ecosystem types, resulting in flawed policies with loopholes in forest reserve selection.
4. Most of the small amounts of remaining high productivity old-growth forests are slated for logging - over 75%.
5. We need an immediate logging moratorium of all high productivity old-growth forests, endangered forest ecosystem types (based on BEC zones), major more intact areas (known as “hot spots”), exceptionally old forests, and landscape units (clusters of watersheds) where scant old-growth levels place them at "high risk" of losing species and ecological integrity, while developing science-based regulations to protect old-growth forests systematically.
The BC government must also enact incentives and regulations to develop a value-added, second-growth forest industry to support thousands of BC's forestry workers. Second-growth forests now constitute the vast majority of the forests of BC (97% of the high productivity sites with the best growing conditions).
Numerous studies show that protected areas, including protecting old-growth forests, typically results in greater net positive impacts on the economy than the traditional resource extraction industries, when factoring in recreation and tourism, enhanced real estate values near protected areas, clean water and fisheries values (commercial and recreational), non-timber forest products, carbon offsets, and attracting skilled labour (including high tech workers) who relocated to areas with a higher environmental quality of life.
Financial and legal support for First Nations land use plans and Indigenous Protected Areas including Tribal Parks is the key game-changer for actual protection of old-growth forests on the ground in BC. Across much of the province, First Nations whose unceded lands these are have a significant stake in old-growth logging, in the form of revenue-sharing, employment and joint venture agreements with major companies, as well as through their own logging tenures. Timber companies and both the current and previous BC governments have worked to increase the economic dependence of First Nations communities on logging old-growth forests through these policies and agreements. Given the lack of economic alternatives in most of these communities, the protection of old-growth forests is fundamentally dependent on funding from governments and environmental-groups to help build conservation-based economic alternatives in First Nations communities, such as the $120 million in conservation financing ($60 million from environmental groups, $30 million from the federal government, $30 million from the province) to finance Indigenous tourism ventures, non-timber forest products industries, and clean energy projects that formed part of the basis of the Great Bear Rainforest agreement.