Re: “High, mighty and lonely,” March 22.
What kind of “civilization” are we? To take the last ancient big-tree forests with no thought for the future or the forest? What kind of forest management is this?
The last of the giants are being cut right now. We need an immediate moratorium on the logging of these ancient forests, groves and valleys on Vancouver Island and on the south coast of B.C. So far, only six per cent of the original extent of these ancient forests has been protected on Vancouver Island.
The felling of the last of the giants is symbolic of a race to the bottom. This is not about jobs. If it were, then how does this destruction account for the permanent closure of some some 75 mills since 2000, of which 33 were on the coast and 17 on Vancouver Island?
Log exports, wood waste and mill closures are the main reasons for job loss. Log exports have risen from three per cent in 1992 to 31 per cent in 2011. Between 2000 and 2009, about 44,500 jobs have been lost in the forest industry.
Cutting the giants is not forestry, it is timber mining for no return to the people of B.C., to the communities and to the future of our province.
Vicky Husband
Victoria
