Ancient Forest Alliance Campaign Director TJ Watt stands beside a giant old-growth redcedar tree in the unprotected Jurassic Grove near Port Renfrew in Pacheedaht territory.

Earth Day — Environmental Groups to BC Government: Go Forward, Not Backward on Old-Growth Protection and Modernization of BC Forestry

Victoria, BC – This Earth Day, the Ancient Forest Alliance (AFA) and Endangered Ecosystems Alliance (EEA) are calling on the BC government to refocus on their incomplete measures to protect old-growth forests, implement their draft Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework, and ensure a transition to a sustainable, value-added second-growth forest industry. At the same time, the groups are issuing a strong warning: commercial logging must not be permitted in protected areas under the guise of wildfire risk reduction.

“The BC government can go in two basic directions in response to the current tariff threats from the U.S.: take the easy but foolish route by falling back on the destructive status quo of old-growth logging and raw log exports, or instead take the opportunity to invest in a modernized, sustainable, value-added, second-growth forest industry that is the future of forestry in BC, while protecting the last old-growth forests,” said Ken Wu, Executive Director of EEA. “The verbal musings by the Ministry of Forests to discuss potential logging with BC Parks in parks and protected areas is a red flag for us – and a serious red line if it takes the form of commercial logging, as opposed to non-commercial restoration of fire-dependent ecosystems where decades of fire suppression has occurred. Crossing the red line into commercial logging of protected areas and/or Old-Growth Management Areas would become the biggest regret of the BC NDP government, environmentally speaking, if they choose to go there – we would ensure that this is so.”

This Earth Day, AFA and EEA are calling on the provincial government to:

  • Establish a BC Protected Areas Strategy to proactively pursue the protection of priority ecosystems through shared decision-making with First Nations.
  • Develop Ecosystem-Based Protection Targets to ensure endangered ecosystems and big-tree old-growth forests are fully protected in both legislated protected areas and in conservation reserves (forest reserves). The forthcoming Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework offers the greatest opportunity to implement these targets.
  • Provide “solutions space” funding to First Nations to help secure the remaining 1.3 million hectares of priority old-growth deferrals by offsetting lost forestry revenues.
  • Ensure a transition to sustainable logging of second-growth forests, which now constitute the vast majority of forest lands in southern BC.
  • Close logging loopholes by ending logging in forest reserves such as Old-Growth Management Areas and Wildlife Habitat Areas, and ensuring commercial logging within parks or conservation reserves remains prohibited.
  • Expand a smart forest industry by incentivizing value-added second-growth manufacturing, ending raw log exports, and promoting eco-forestry.
  • Create a BC Conservation Economy Strategy to support eco-tourism, clean tech, and sustainable industries in protected areas.
Ancient Forest Alliance Campaign Director TJ Watt stands beside a giant old-growth redcedar tree in the unprotected Jurassic Grove near Port Renfrew in Pacheedaht territory.

Ancient Forest Alliance Campaign Director TJ Watt stands in the unprotected Jurassic Grove near Port Renfrew in Pacheedaht territory.

“The BC NDP government should be thanked for its commitment to protect 30% by 2030 by securing over $1 billion in provincial-federal conservation financing to make it happen, deferring logging on 1.2 million hectares of the Technical Advisory Panel’s most at-risk old-growth, and starting the value-added, second-growth transition – but it still comes up short on both conservation policies and sustainable job creation,” said TJ Watt, Campaign Director of AFA.

In response to mounting pressures, including the threat of escalating U.S. tariffs, AFA and EEA call on the BC government to build a diversified and resilient economy by transitioning to a sustainable, value-added, second-growth forest industry, protecting old-growth forests in partnership with First Nations, and creating incentives to support a conservation-based economy.

“This Earth Day, we urge the province to move forward, not backward, to build a diversified, resilient economy in BC while undertaking the vital and overdue protection of endangered ecosystems,” said Watt. “The BC government can achieve this by establishing a BC Protected Areas Strategy to proactively seek the protection of candidate protected areas in priority ecosystems through shared decision-making with First Nations. This strategy should be guided by Ecosystem-Based Protection Targets to ensure endangered ecosystems and big-tree old-growth forests are fully protected, and in the interim, we urgently need ‘solutions space’ funding to offset First Nations’ lost forestry revenues to help secure the remaining 1.3 million hectares of priority old-growth deferrals.”

AFA's TJ Watt beside a giant old-growth redcedar tree cut down by logging company Teal-Jones in the Caycuse Valley in Ditidaht territory.

AFA’s TJ Watt beside a giant old-growth redcedar tree cut down by logging company Teal-Jones in the Caycuse Valley.

To secure permanent protection for endangered old-growth forests, the groups also issue a warning to the Ministry of Forests that commercial logging within protected areas under the pretext of wildfire risk reduction will be greatly opposed.

In fire-driven Interior ecosystems of BC dominated by lodgepole pine, Interior Douglas-fir, western larch, and Ponderosa pine, decades of fire suppression by the province, carried out to maximize timber values for logging companies, have disrupted natural fire cycles. In some areas, this has led to unnaturally dense stands with greater fuel loads, including allowing in-grown trees (that would normally burn down when they are smaller from regular, natural ground fires) to grow larger and then act as “fire ladders” that enable flames to climb from the forest floor into the canopies, where they can catch onto the branches of the largest trees. These forest giants are normally fire-resistant at their bases due to their extremely thick, fire-resistant bark on their lower trunks, often allowing them to survive successive natural fire cycles. The increased fuel loads and the dense fire ladder trees, combined with climate change, are thus creating more intensive forest fires.

In these instances, ecosystem restoration in protected areas in the form of non-commercial (i.e., not for sale) thinning, prescribed burns, and where appropriate, an ecological wildfire policy of allowing natural wildfires to burn where it is deemed safe for human communities, can be merited to help restore the ecology of these fire-driven ecosystems (much biodiversity is dependent on the aftermath of these fires, where life proliferates) and to minimize the ultimate fire risk for any nearby communities. BC Parks has already used these methods in the past.

However, commercial logging for profit in parks and protected areas under the guise of fire management would be a completely different activity. It would include targeting of the larger, more commercially valuable trees and would set a precedent and open the door for a much greater scale of logging that is far more impactful than ecosystem-restoration initiatives. As such, conservation groups completely oppose it.

In addition, it should be noted that none of this has any relevance to coastal or Interior rainforests, should any PR efforts be undertaken by government or industry to justify potential logging in old-growth rainforests in protected areas under a fake fire-risk management banner.

“If the Ministry of Forests is in discussions with BC Parks to permit commercial logging in protected areas under the pretext of reducing wildfire risk, this is a red line that must not be crossed under any circumstances,” said Wu. “Non-commercial ecosystem restoration and fire-proofing areas adjacent to human communities are very different than commercial logging. Allowing commercial logging for profit in parks, conservancies, or Old Growth Management Areas (OGMAs) under the guise of fire risk management would ignite the biggest conservation battle in years against the province.”

“Logging old-growth forests for commercial purposes in the name of fire prevention is a Trojan horse for ecological destruction,” said Watt. “The province must focus on tackling climate change, the key driver behind the increasing scale and severity of forest fires, and non-commercial ecological restoration, while securing the protection of endangered ecosystems, especially carbon-rich old-growth forests, which play a vital role in climate stability.”

Endangered Ecosystems Alliance Executive Director Ken Wu stands beside a giant old-growth redcedar tree in the unprotected Eden Grove near Port Renfrew in Pacheedaht territory.

Endangered Ecosystems Alliance Executive Director Ken Wu stands beside a giant old-growth redcedar tree in the unprotected Eden Grove near Port Renfrew in Pacheedaht territory.

BC's ninth widest Douglas-fir cut down by BC Timber Sales (BCTS) in the Nahmint Valley in 2018.

BC Timber Sales (BCTS) Review Submission – AFA & EEA

Ancient Forest Alliance & Endangered Ecosystem Alliance’s recommendations to the BC Timber Sales Review.

Overarching Priority Recommendations:

  1. Prohibit cutblocks in all at-risk old-growth forests within BC Timber Sales operating areas: BCTS should implement a policy prohibiting the planning and sale of cutblocks within the 5 million hectares of unprotected old-growth forests identified by the BC government’s own independent science panel as most at-risk. This includes the 2.6 million hectares of the highest-priority at-risk old-growth forests recommended for immediate deferral by the Technical Advisory Panel (TAP), as well as the 2.4 million hectares of additional unprotected old-growth forests that also meet the TAP criteria for the biggest, oldest, and most endangered. If the BC government is serious about embracing the recommendations of its own science panel, this is the least they can do.
  2. Direct conservation funding dollars toward securing the deferral and protection of old-growth forests in BC Timber Sales operating areas: Given the BC government’s commitment to expanding the protection of old-growth forests in BC, the province has an opportunity and an obligation through its direct management of BC Timber Sales to take a proactive approach to achieving this goal. Therefore, we recommend allocating a proportionate share of the BC Nature Agreement and Conservation Financing Mechanism to support First Nations in their capacity, stewardship and economic development needs related to Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas (IPCAs) on the land where BCTS operates. Most urgently, this includes providing “solutions space” funding to help First Nations offset the economic impacts of lost logging revenues when being asked to implement deferrals in the most at-risk old-growth forests in their territories.

Immediate Recommended Changes to the Current BC Timber Sales Policy Guidance on TAP Deferrals:

  1. Use field verification to identify and defer at-risk old-growth forests missed in the TAP mapping process – allow additions, not just subtractions, of technically misidentified stands: The TAP recommended that field verification be used to identify and defer at-risk old-growth forests that meet their criteria but were missed in the initial analysis due to gaps in BC government data. Currently, BCTS only uses field verification to remove areas from deferral status which don’t meet the TAP criteria, demonstrating a clear bias toward more old-growth logging (see BCTS guidance section “Where Field Verification is Required”). Instead, forest engineers with BCTS should use field verification to assess whether any forest within a proposed cutblock meets the criteria for deferral (not just the TAP polygons). When they do, they should be immediately added and deferred from logging, pending approval from First Nations.
  2. Require replacement old-growth deferrals if logging proceeds: According to BCTS deferral guidance 1. d, where First Nations indicate they do not support TAP deferrals, there is currently no requirement to identify replacement old-growth forests after logging proceeds in Ancient or Priority Big-treed polygons. Instead, replacement deferral areas should be required in these cases, as they are required by BCTS in TAP-identified Remnant Old Ecosystems (one of three categories of most at-risk old-growth identified by TAP). These deferrals must be placed in unprotected old-growth forests that could otherwise be logged in the future (i.e. within the Timber Harvesting Land Base, as opposed to areas not available for logging).
  3. Strengthen criteria for replacement deferrals: The Ministry of Forests’ Field Verification of Priority Old Forest Deferral Areas: Technical Guidance (p.11) states that “Replacement Priority Old Forest Deferral Areas cannot be placed in areas unavailable for forest harvesting.” However, the Ministry’s Guidance on BCTS Implementation of Technical Advisory Panel (TAP) Old Growth Deferral Polygon Recommendations states that replacement areas should be identified based on “like-for-like” ecological characteristics, rather than whether they fall within the Timber Harvesting Land Base (THLB). When a replacement deferral area must be located, BCTS should be required to identify an area that is ecologically “like-for-like” and also located within the THLB to ensure additional protections for at-risk old-growth forests that are otherwise open to logging.
  4. Default to honouring deferrals, not logging them: In cases where First Nations request more time to consider TAP deferrals or have yet to respond, BCTS’ current guidance 2. c. is to permit logging within polygons that meet the Ancient or Priority Big-treed criteria. BCTS should not be permitted to log in these areas until First Nations have decided on the proposed deferrals – the default must not be “ignore First Nations and just log the old-growth.”
  5. Provide transparency in deferral changes: BCTS should be required to make all changes and replacements to deferral areas publicly accessible in a timely and transparent manner. This can drag out for years – but there is a genuine environmental crisis, and the conservation movement will no longer acquiesce to endless heel-dragging.

Become a Leader in a Sustainable, Value-Added, Second-Growth Forestry Industry

  1. To support a more sustainable, value-added forest economy, an appurtenancy clause should require that logs from BCTS sales not destined for BC mills be sold through regional log sorts and manufactured within British Columbia. This would secure a guaranteed log supply for BC-based companies.

Conclusion

As a Crown agency, BC Timber Sales stands at a crossroads that affects all British Columbians. With direct government oversight, BCTS has both the opportunity and the obligation to implement bold policy changes that reflect the government’s commitments to biodiversity, climate action, and Indigenous rights. BCTS is the best vehicle for the province to lead the way on its land base toward the promised “paradigm shift” embraced by the BC NDP government in its BC Old-Growth Strategic Review panel’s recommendations. Strengthening old-growth protections within BCTS operating areas—especially the most at-risk forests identified by the province’s own science panel—would send a powerful signal that the government is serious about ending the logging of irreplaceable ecosystems and transitioning to a value-added, second-growth industry, which is the future for BC’s forest industry.

Conversely, if BCTS continues to auction off the last of the most endangered old-growth forests in the province, it will severely undermine public trust and the province’s credibility on environmental leadership.

The choice is clear: BCTS can help lead us toward a sustainable future focused on value-added products from second-growth forests. Or it can continue selling off irreplaceable ancient forests that, once gone, are lost forever.

The path BCTS chooses now will help define the legacy this government leaves for the land, communities, and generations to come.

The photos below highlight old-growth logging and forests within BC Timber Sales’ tenure on Vancouver Island, BC.

Western Trillium

Vividly white when they first bloom, then frequently changing colour to deep pinks and purples as they mature, few rainforest flowers are as charismatic as the western trillium. Also called the “wake-robin” in reference to its early spring emergence, the trillium is immediately recognizable by its single flower atop three open leaves. Trilliums may take ten years to go from seed to their first flowering, and yet the above-ground plant only lasts a few short months, vanishing quietly as spring turns to summer. After flowering, trilliums may lie dormant for up to five years. So if you find one in the forest, savour it! It may be years before it flowers again.

SOLD OUT: AFA’s 15th Anniversary Celebration and Fundraiser on May 1st!

UPDATE: Tickets now SOLD OUT. Thank you for your support!

We’re thrilled to invite you to attend Ancient Forest Alliance’s (AFA) 15th Anniversary Celebration & Fundraiser on May 1st in Victoria! Enjoy food, drinks, socializing, a silent auction, and an engaging presentation from AFA campaign director & photographer TJ Watt and co-founder Ken Wu. Plus, there’s a chance to win some awesome AFA gear!

📍 Where: Esquimalt Gorge Park & Pavilion – 1070 Tillicum Rd, Esquimalt, BC, Lək̓ʷəŋən territory
🗓️ When: Thursday, May 1st, 6:00 – 9:00 PM (Doors open at 5:45 PM)
🎟️ Tickets: $35. Limited availability, so act quickly! Comes with free drink and appetizers.

Fifteen years ago, Ancient Forest Alliance started as a small but determined organization with a vision to protect endangered old-growth forests in BC. Since then, thanks to the dedication and passion of supporters like you signing petitions, attending rallies, reaching out to decision-makers, and giving when you can, we’ve grown into a strong, enduring force for change.

From securing the protection of Avatar Grove to exposing the worst logging practices in BC, garnering thousands of news media stories or landing hundreds of millions in conservation financing dollars, together, we’ve helped shape the landscape of forest protection in BC in major ways.

Now, as we mark our 15th anniversary, we’re hosting this special event as an opportunity to come together and celebrate our achievements, reflect on the journey, and rally support for the crucial work ahead.

Enjoy a new slideshow presentation featuring photos, videos, stories, and other highlights from the past 15 years and where we’re going next, along with appetizers, drinks, and mingling with AFA staff, volunteers, donors, and supporters. Plus, you’ll have the chance to win some awesome AFA gear and bid on fabulous silent auction items from several local businesses!

Please save the date, grab your tickets, and join us as we give thanks to our incredible community and raise funds to protect the globally rare old-growth forests in BC!

Can’t make the event but still want to support our efforts? Donate here!

What are Ecosystem-Based Protection Targets, and why does BC need them?

View the slides to learn more & TAKE ACTION NOW by sending a message calling for these measures and more.

Historically, protected areas in BC have focused on ecosystems less coveted by industry. Meanwhile, ecosystems with greater biodiversity and productive forest land, which are highly sought after by industry, are left vulnerable to industrial extraction. It’s been a “save the small trees, log the big trees” approach.

To truly safeguard biodiversity, BC needs “Ecosystem-Based Protection Targets” for every ecosystem type—rainforests, grasslands, dry forests, wetlands, etc.—on a scale large enough to ensure their long-term health and stability.

To be effective, these targets must be fine-filtered enough (i.e., distinguish between small vs. big tree forests), legally binding, and large-scale.

Fortunately, the BC government’s draft Biodiversity & Ecosystem Health Framework provides an opportunity to see these targets implemented, but it will take much public pressure. Help us call on the BC government to use Ecosystem-Based Targets to:

1️⃣ Proactively identify and pursue the protection of most at-risk ecosystems in BC, such as the big-tree old-growth forests.
2️⃣ Work with First Nations to develop long-term conservation solutions in their territories, using BC Nature Agreement funding to support this work.

🗣️ Speak up! Take action today.

Thank you to these foundation donors for their generosity!

Donations through foundations are a great way to contribute to Ancient Forest Alliance, as this funding allows us to continue our important work protecting the at-risk old-growth forests in BC and ensuring a transition to a sustainable, second-growth forestry industry!

Thank you to:

Your generosity and belief in the work we’re doing here at AFA are greatly appreciated, and we’re very grateful!