The new funding is welcomed by conservation groups that say the province has voiced support for old forest protections while continuing to allow clearcut logging in rare ecosystems and in the habitat of endangered species
Read moreB.C.'s $300M old-growth fund puts First Nations 'in the driver's seat' (Time Colonist)
$300-million investment aims to save B.C.'s old-growth forests by offering First Nations sustainable economic alternatives to industrial logging.
Read moreEEA's Feedback on Canada's National 2030 Biodiversity Strategy
National Biodiversity Strategy feedback
What are the key features of a successful National Biodiversity Strategy?
Protected areas must constitute the foundation to reach the 25% by 2025 and 30% by 2030 minimum targets – not less stringent “conserved areas” that lack the protection standards (eg. may allow commercial logging and other industrial activities) and permanency (many are readily removable) of protected areas.
Ecosystem-based targets must be set by ecological science and Traditional Ecological Knowledge committees to protect the full diversity of ecosystems on a sufficient scale to ensure the long-term ecological viability of each ecosystem.
B.C. MP seeks ban on old-growth log exports by 2030 (North Shore News)
Photo by TJ Watt/The Ancient Forest Alliance.
The motion, submitted by Liberal MP Patrick Weiler this week, aims to end old-growth logging on federal lands and halt the export of ancient logs and related products.
A B.C. MP representing the longest named riding in Canada has introduced a motion to ban the export of old-growth logs and any products made from them.
Patrick Weiler, Liberal MP for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, introduced the private members’ motion Thursday. The motion calls for an end to the export of old growth as soon as possible but no later than 2030.
Read moreEEA's submission to the BC Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework
These comments highlight the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance’s (EEA) key input for BC’s forthcoming Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework (BEHF).
We greatly commend the BC government for moving forward with this initiative, which potentially could be the framework for a paradigm shift - which the Old-Growth Strategic Review recommendations called for - that puts ecosystem health first in all land-use and forestry decisions. If done well, the Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework could be a globally recognized leading policy framework for protecting biodiversity, old-growth forests and endangered ecosystems - or it can fall flat if the myopic and pervasive forces of the status quo continue to undermine progress and squander the opportunity for all.
Read moreHow a new ‘nature economy’ is transforming the fight for B.C.’s ancient forests (Global News)
Climbing Big Lonely Doug (TJ Watt/The Ancient Forest Alliance).
Have you ever seen a tree so big it would take 10 people to wrap their arms around its trunk – and that still wouldn’t be enough? A tree as tall as a downtown office building?
These trees exist and, in British Columbia’s coastal rainforests, are measured and even tracked by the people fighting to protect them.
Read more‘The right direction’: new B.C. plan could actually protect old-growth forests (The Narwhal)
Endangered Ecosystems Alliance executive director Ken Wu is hopeful the B.C. government's new forestry plan will lead to protection for ancient forests around Port Renfrew and elsewhere in the province. (TJ Watt / Ancient Forest Alliance)
A “war in the woods” has simmered for decades in B.C., sometimes erupting into high-profile protests and arrests over plans to log ancient trees in places like Clayoquot Sound and Fairy Creek.
This week, the provincial government unveiled a suite of new measures that aim to accelerate old-growth protection and broker a truce. Measures include new initiatives to finance old-growth forest protection, more Indigenous participation in land-use decisions and an end to prioritizing timber extraction over all other values, including biodiversity and carbon storage.
Read moreB.C. moves to fast-track its overdue old growth protection commitments (The Globe and Mail)
B.C. Premier David Eby speaks during a news conference in Vancouver, on Feb. 5. The NDP government made a commitment in the 2020 election campaign to protect old growth – officially recognizing that the value of old-growth trees left standing can be far greater than the value of those trees as timber products. (Darryl Dyck/The Canadian Press)
The B.C. government is seeking to harness the financial clout of non-profit conservation groups to protect endangered ecosystems, with a commitment to create a new trust fund to leverage charitable donations for nature with its own dollars.
Premier David Eby announced on Wednesday his plans to fast-track his government’s progress on protecting old growth, including $25-million to help First Nations participate in land-use decisions on old-growth forests, and $90-million added to the B.C. Manufacturing Jobs Fund to help forestry companies retool their mills to adapt to second-growth timber.
Read moreConservationists optimistic over David Eby's commitments to protect B.C.'s biodiversity - News Article (CBC News)
An aerial photograph of the Nahmint Valley outside Port Alberni, B.C., shows protected old growth groves along the water and replanted hillsides that were previously logged. (Chris Corday/CBC)
In mandate letters to his land stewardship and forestry ministers, B.C. Premier David Eby says he wants to double the amount of protected land in the province, support new Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas, and move faster on recommendations around the logging of old growth trees.
They're conservation goals advocates have been calling on for years to protect B.C.'s unique biodiversity, which has thousands of species at risk due to development and climate change.
"This is potentially a major leap toward protecting endangered ecosystems and the most at-risk, productive stands of old-growth forests left in B.C.," said Ken Wu in a release from the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance.
Read moreB.C. vows to reverse ‘short-term thinking’ with pledge to protect 30% of province by 2030 - News Article (The Narwhal)
BC Premier David Eby has committed to protecting 30 per cent of B.C. by 2030, doubling current protections. Photo: Province of British Columbia, Flickr
For years, our main campaign in BC has been that the province must commit to the federal protected areas targets (to protect 25% by 2025 and 30% by 2030 of Canada's land and marine areas) at a minimum and to provide conservation financing support for First Nations sustainable economic development linked to protecting the most at-risk, productive (big tree) old-growth forests and the most endangered ecosystems.
Today Premier David Eby committed BC to meeting the federal protected areas target of protecting 30% by 2030 of the land area (currently 15% of BC is in legislated protected areas), joining Quebec now which made the pledge much earlier.
Read moreBusinesses ally with environmental groups to push B.C. to protect biodiversity - News Article (The National Observer)
Businesses are urging the B.C. government to capitalize on Ottawa’s offer to invest hundreds of millions to save threatened ecosystems in the run-up to the UN Biodiversity Conference in Montreal next month.
A total of 250 businesses are backing a resolution urging B.C.’s new Premier David Eby to stave off the extinction and climate crisis by backing the federal government’s 30x30 promise — to protect 30 per cent of the country’s land and waters by 2030.
Read moreB.C. hasn’t taken $50 million federal offer for old-growth forest protections - News Article (The Narwhal)
Endangered Ecosystems Alliance Executive Director Ken Wu on a cedar stump in the Walbran Valley on Vancouver Island. Photo: TJ Watt
The federal government has budgeted $2.3 billion to expand the protected areas system in Canada - of which BC's share would be between $200 to $400 million - including $55 million specifically allocated to prioritize protecting the most at-risk old-growth stands, contingent on a matching BC commitment.
That is, if BC provided matching funds of between $200 to $400 million, including $55 million of its own to help save the best old-growth stands, it would result in a total funding pot of between $400 to $800 million to expand protected areas in BC, with $110 million focused on protecting the best old-growth forests (still not enough mind you to protect all such stands, but the rest of the funds worth hundreds of millions of dollars can also be used to protect old-growth forests, along with other ecosystems). Additional funds from private sources and environmental groups, like the Nature-Based Solutions Foundation, could top it up by hundreds of millions. The total funding of $600 to $1 billion if targeted correctly would be a game-changer to protect much of the old-growth forests in BC and other vital ecosystems.
Read moreConservation group buys stand of majestic old-growth as gift for First Nation - News Article (National Observer)
Photo: Garth Asham, Kanaka Lands Department Assistant by an ancient Interior Douglas-fir tree on the newly acquired private property by the Nature-Based Solutions Foundation.
Read an article in the National Observer about our work at the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance in our collaboration with the Kanaka Bar Indian Band, the Nature-Based Solutions Foundation and the Ancient Forest Alliance to help protect the old-growth forests and native ecosystems in Kanaka Bar territory, via the Nature-Based Solutions Foundation.
Read moreB.C. Indigenous conservation plan gets private backing - News Article (The Globe and Mail)
Celina Starnes of the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance stands under an old-growth Western redcedar near Kanaka Bar Indian Band, home to the T’eqt’’aqtn’mux, in British Columbia this past Sept. 21.
PHOTOGRAPHY BY RAFAL GERSZAK/THE GLOBE AND MAIL
Here is a new article in the Globe and Mail by Justine Hunter about the Nature-Based Solutions Foundation's (NBSF) purchase last week of potentially the most diverse old-growth forest in BC - with both dry-adapted old-growth Ponderosa pine and wet-adapted western redcedar growing side-by-side - on private lands, to be given back with a conservation covenant to the Kanaka Bar Indian Band south of Lytton. It also features the Kanaka Bar's Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area (IPCA) proposal that we are also supporting on Crown/ unceded Kanaka Bar lands, that would protect about 350 square kilometres of land in their territory, including 125 square kilometers of old-growth forests.
Read moreKanaka Bar Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area (IPCA) Supported by the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance - News Article (Black Press)
Read a new article about the amazing 35,000 hectare Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area (IPCA), which will protect 12,500 hectares of some of the rarest and least represented old-growth forests in BC, planned by the Kanaka Bar Band (a Nlaka'pamux First Nation) in the Fraser Canyon near Lytton.
The Nature-Based Solutions Foundation (NBSF), Endangered Ecosystems Alliance (EEA), and Ancient Forest Alliance (AFA) have been supporting this initiative as part of our Old-Growth Solutions Initiative to help protect old-growth forests across BC.
Read moreKanaka Bar Indian Band to Protect Unique Old-Growth Forests and Endangered Ecosystems in Proposed T'eqt'aqtn Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area
Over 12,500 hectares of some of BC’s most endangered and diverse old-growth forests will be protected in in the territory of the Kanaka Bar Band, a Nlaka'pamux First Nation in the Fraser Canyon near Lytton, when a major new Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area (IPCA) is finalized. The Kanaka Bar Band announced their vision today to protect a total of about 35,000 hectares of their unceded lands in British Columbia in this IPCA.
Read moreToronto Star: Mosaic defers logging of old-growth on Vancouver Island and Haida Gwaii
British Columbia’s largest private landowner, Mosaic Forest Management, is halting logging in nearly 100,000 acres of old-growth forest for the next 25 years.
The forestry company announced the deferral on March 16 and said it’s transitioning to a carbon credit program, which is expected to generate several hundred million dollars in revenue.
Read more1.05 Million Hectares of the Most At-Risk Old-Growth Forests in B.C. Now Under Logging Deferrals
Today a big step towards saving old-growth forests in BC was announced - with a significant way yet to go. An area about the size of Jasper National Park, about 1.05 million hectares of the priority, unprotected, most at-risk old-growth forests (the grandest, oldest and rarest stands), have now been placed under deferral from logging - with First Nations and the province having added 480,000 hectares recently, announced today.
Read moreCTV Vancouver Island: B.C. defers logging in additional 1.7 million hectares of at-risk old growth
British Columbia's forests minister says the province has worked with First Nations to defer logging across more than a million hectares of at-risk old-growth forests, an area greater than 4,100 Stanley Parks.
Read moreVancouver Sun: Environmental group gives guarded support for company's B.C. old-growth forest plan
Mosaic Forest Management, which oversees the private lands of logging companies TimberWest and Island Timberlands, announced the deferral last week along with intentions to finance the plan through a carbon credit program that is expected to raise several hundred million dollars by 2047.
Read more