It's time to act for BC’s primary & old growth forests, some of the world's most important rainforest ecosystems & critical wildlife habitats. Your govt. won a majority on promises to abide by your OldGrowth Panel's deadlines, & your delay is proving catastrophic..
BC's intact living primary forests have dwindled down to critical levels due to a century & a half of Govts' appropriation of sacred lands inhabited & used by 1st Nations for centuries. Notably, at inception BC's forests were largely intact & teeming with biodiversity.
What's happened since is Forestry's continual wipeout by logging corps of entire swathes of BC's most precious 'Lungs of the Earth' -- i.e. our oldest living forests -- for the low-balled value of their marketable "timber": A TRAGIC LOSS of priceless eco-benefits that virtually guarantees BC's failure to mitigate climate change-!?
Only in the last 3/4 decades have the BC govt's dire Natural Resource policies come to light, & they hardly embody Canada's Constitutional stewardship needs. But despite steadily-growing heartfelt opposition to BC's disastrous logging practices (ie. clearcutting), successive govts have charged forward in blind ignorance of its public & of science's best info.
Your govt has claimed to better previous govts re. eco-improvements/ laws that protect BC's best assets & give communities false hope of Climate Action, with vows to "support" our vital forests & nice-sounding words like "decolonization" -- & even promises to implement the "paradigm shift" called for by your own Old Growth Panel -- yet our forests continue to be felled at such a sickeningly sped-up pace (backed by BC's Supreme Court as proof) that makes it clear your govt still supports logging corps' rapacious & unending greed/speed to KILL our ONLY natural climate protectors/C02 sinks.. i.e. FAILURE
Your govt could have begun to 'Build Back Better' by keeping your promises to implement the Old Growth Panel's forward-thinking recommendations - of which protecting Old Growth is KEY to Building Back Better & protecting all BCers' best interests!?
Failing those basic steps is disastrous enough. But claiming otherwise in the name of reconciliation, WHILE forcing impoverished 1st Nations to participate in egregious clearcut wipeouts of their once-lush & proud great stands (whose pristine abundance had testified to deep native knowledge/ skills capable of LEADING a renewable industry rooted in nature-based longevity) is grossly unacceptable!
We will not win unless ALL remaining intact old growth ecosystems are left intact!
The best & newest science agrees: industrial logging in BC is unsustainable -- & V. worrying, with resultant 'hotspots' causing critical biodiversity loss, droughts & other climate disasters. Tho less than 10% of BC's old growth forests remain, most are slated to be logged -- which puts aLL of BC (if not the entire biosphere) in jeopardy..
Deforestation exacerbates human errors/weaknesses in this climate Emergency -- eg. Our emissions keep rising & adding to global warming. In coming months/years, your actions TODAY will define our future -- & being 1 of few 'green' (forested) refuges left on Earth, we wait.. (but the safety-net a Just Transition to sustainability can give us NOW, cannoT!)
Old-growth forests, despite scientists' best efforts/R&D to invent effective C02 sequestration, are still the most -- no, the ONLY -- effective C02 sinks known to humankind. Allowing them to be cleared -- & our multi-billion$ eco-tourist industry to die out along with Old-Growth's threatened biodiversity -- is a sure suicide/ SPECIESCIDE we just cannot afford..
Please SEE how many educated BCers are choosing to be arrested rather than allow our last OldGrowth elders/ lifeboats to be logged like so much wood!? Then fire Katrine Conroy & save our best trees' lives (it's only fair!)
You yourself have said our ancient forests are "worth more standing" -- & you're right: i.e. Keeping their entirety alive & intact is CRITICAL to mitigating biodiversity loss/ climate change, providing clean air/water, capturing/storing vast amounts of atmospheric C02, regulating ground/ surface water flow, preventing fires/ floods: the list goes on & on of Old-Growth's uniquely timely qualities: our living SAVIOURS, which you & (appare only ½) your govt want to deny us/ the world!?
Right now, BC communities are seeing & feeling the deadly, direct effects of decades of destruction of these MOST IMPORTANT ECOSYSTEMS. Yet status quo clearcuts & extraction continue apace!!? & Fairy Creek forest defenders are still being arrested -- proving your govt. is stalling on real Climate Action, with an old-school pro-logging puppet of a Forestry Minister dooming us all to a future of fire & Hell & orphaned investments: WHY!!?
At this point, clearing our last intact ancient forests equals the stupidity of demolishing the Great Pyramids for the value of their stones-!!? (Actually worse, given our ancient forests' invaluable benefits that ensure successful outcomes for us all). It's up to you & your govt. to intervene NOW with actual laws that protect BC's oldest wettest forests: our globally-unique temperate rainforests, the giants of global Just Recovery, Beautiful BC heritage, Climate Action & so much more..
The world needs these key forests as much as we do, having cleared most of their own indigenous H²0-/ 0²-supplying forests long ago (which they doubtless regret, having become drought-ridden deserts like the others: Iran, Iraq, Australia, California.. Brazil..?)
Isn't it time you & your govt SHOW US that you actually care, & have the integrity to do what's right -- for our kids' (& their kids') futures, if nothing else?
Even industry pro's know climate change is real -- with insurance pull-outs from TMX just the start of the REAL recovery from Colonial oppression's ugly hold on our destinies. YOU & YOUR GOVT. can put us on top (with our friends Old-Growth) oR doom us to the bottom of a bitumen spill -- but either way, change is coming.. & it won'T be kind to the culprits of Climate's/ Nature's downfall: ie. polluters & their champions..
Thank you Premier Horgan, for hearing input from one whose family's dedication to the NDP ended with me, as I'm young/old enough to see only eco-INaction from your party, which i can't condone.. (I trust you understand)
Sincerely from my heart,