Showing posts with label Elisabeth May. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Elisabeth May. Show all posts

Thursday, June 5, 2014

Forests in Canada

By  Liliana Usvat
Blog 203 -365


I am reading a book about forests in Canada. "At the Cutting Edge The Crisis in Canada's Forests" By Elisabeth May

I am amazed by the information provided in her book.

The forests is not protected against overcuting.
Forest dependent species such as the woodland caribou, spotted owl and pine marten are in trouble due to loss of habitat.

Deforestation around the world has global implications in reducing our planet ability to cope with the ever increasing release of carbon into our atmosphere. The technology exceed the ecosystems ability to recover.

In 1990 Greenpeace ran a newspaper ad. It pictured a clear -cut running as far as the eye could see.  below was the caption "They said we could never run out of cod either" referring to the fact that overfishing in Canada depleted the oceans of cod.

Canada is the world larger exporter of wood. In 2003 exports of forest products netted $40 billions.
Over 1 milion of people were employed to cut the forests in 2003.

Forests balance the climate, protect fresh water purify the air and provide food and shelter to myriad of species.

Out of 417,6 millions of hectares 294.7 millions are considered productive or commercial forest land meaning these ancient forest will be cut for the profit of few.

Like fishery, Canada's forest are largely a public resource publicly owned. Only 7% of Canadian forest is privately held compared with 70% in USA and Sweden.
 
The industry does not own the forest it logs.
Leases are cheap. Industry never pays the amount that ever approximate the commercial value in therms of the forest it converts in cash let alone its greater value in terms of ecological service.

Short term gain - logging the forest is subsidized while long term interests the sustainability of the resource itself and all other future values are heavily discounted.

For many years there has been virtually no public oversight of forest policy.

Leases come in a profusion of categories TFL, TSA, CAAF FMA
There are two type of leases based on specific areas and on designated volume.
Volume based leases tend to go to smaller operators while area based tenure arrangements tend to go to large companies.

Alberta Government decision to grant long term leases to two Japanese companies 5.8 millions of hectares respective 2.8 millions of hectares created alarm and media interest.

Sometimes is so sad to read these numbers and think the alarming facts that you are intrigued that more people are not aware of these facts.