Nature photographer discovers ancient ‘freak-of-nature’ tree hiding in plain sight: ‘I’ve never seen a tree as impressive as this one’

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December 15, 2023
The Cool Down
By Jeremiah Budin

A nature photographer in British Columbia discovered one of the largest old-growth cedars ever documented off the coast of Vancouver Island — and he’s not telling you or anyone else how to find it.

TJ Watt, a co-founder of the Ancient Forest Alliance, a charitable organization that works to protect endangered old-growth forests, waited more than a year after first happening across the massive tree, which he nicknamed “The Wall,” to even tell the world about its existence, according to The Washington Post.

During that time, Watt consulted with members of the Ahousaht First Nation, who have lived in the area for thousands of years.

“It was decided that we should keep the tree’s location a secret because these are sensitive areas, and everything could get pretty trampled if word got out where to find it,” Watt told the Post.

He also took time to thoroughly measure and document The Wall. It is believed that the massive tree is over 1,000 years old, standing 151 feet tall and 17 and a half feet in diameter.

“I’ve found thousands and thousands of trees, and I’ve shot hundreds of thousands of photos of old-growth forests,” Watt told the Post. “But I’ve never seen a tree as impressive as this one.”

“It was incredible to stand before it,” he continued. “I’d describe it as a freak of nature because it actually gets wider as it gets taller. As I looked up at it, I felt a sense of awe and wonder.”

Canada’s largest documented tree, a humongous red cedar known as the Cheewhat Giant, is located in the protected Pacific Rim National Park Reserve and stands 182 feet tall and 19 feet in diameter, per the Post.

Old-growth forests play an essential role in wildlife habitat, species diversity, carbon storage, and other crucial ecological processes. However, like so many parts of the natural world, they are threatened by pollution, the effects of human-caused extreme weather events, and the logging industry.

Although trees such as the Cheewhat Giant are protected, per the Post, 80% of the original old-growth forests on Vancouver Island have already been logged, according to the Ancient Forest Alliance. That’s why it is essential that The Wall stays protected and its location unreleased.

Read the original article.

The Globe & Mail: ‘Salmon parks’ in traditional First Nations territory aim to save habitats by stopping old-growth logging

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November 29, 2023
The Globe and Mail
By Justine Hunter

See the original article.

New plan from the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation, aided by the BC and federal governments, signals a shift in Indigenous-led conservation across the province

Backed by a $15.2-million commitment from the federal government, a First Nations community on the west coast of Vancouver Island intends to buy out forestry tenures to stop old-growth logging in selected watersheds around Nootka Sound.

The Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation has declared a string of “salmon parks” in its traditional territories that includes more than 66,000 hectares of watersheds.

The parks are designed to protect critical salmon habitat by maintaining and restoring the land where it intersects with marine ecosystems. Logging can damage the rivers where salmon spawn, and deforestation has been tied to warmer rivers that reduce survival rates for young fish.

Proposed salmon parks on Vancouver and Nootka islands
Red: Proposed salmon parks
Green: Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation territory
Yellow: Nuchatlaht First Nation territory

A map of the proposed salmon park and First Nations' boundaries

MURAT YÜKSELIR / THE GLOBE AND MAIL SOURCE: BC GOVERNMENT; HA-SHILTH-SA OPENSTREETMAP

The salmon parks of Nootka Sound offer an example of a shift that is coming across the province as a result of the new $1-billion Nature Agreement signed on Nov. 3 between Canada, BC and the First Nations Leadership Council. Significantly more land will be designated for conservation, which in turn will change how and where the province exploits its natural resources.

To meet commitments by the federal and provincial governments, BC will need to set aside more than 10 million hectares of new biologically important areas for protection from development over the next six years. Much of that will be achieved through Indigenous-led conservation projects that are now on a fast track for approval. This includes the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation plan, which will require additional funding to complete.

British Columbia has the greatest diversity of species, ecosystems and habitats of any jurisdiction in Canada, and both the federal and provincial governments have promised to protect 30 per cent of the country’s land and water by 2030.

The provincial government says there are currently 18.5 million hectares of protected and conserved areas, making up 19.6 per cent of BC’s total land.

A number of First Nations in BC have declared Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas that will be among the first in the queue for consideration by the new tripartite committee, which will decide where the nature agreement funding will go. Federal Environment and Climate Change Minister Steven Guilbeault promised financing for the Mowachaht/Muchalaht salmon parks in late October, providing tacit approval of the First Nation’s IPCAs.

Five species of Pacific salmon run through the traditional territories of the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation, but stocks are in decline. Eric Angel, the project manager for the salmon parks, said the selected areas include some of the last remaining old-growth forest ecosystems in the region.

“What we are bringing to this is a much more creative and nuanced view of what a sustainable economy looks like in rural communities. What we’ve been doing up till now has been liquidating a one-time resource, old-growth forests. What we need to do is find ways to harvest forest products,” he said, “while we also build economies around tourism and conservation and stewardship.”

Celina Starnes from Endangered Ecosystems Alliance looks up at the big-leaf maple grove of the Burman River valley, which lies within the Mowachaht/Muchalaht salmon-park system.

Celina Starnes from Endangered Ecosystems Alliance looks up at the big-leaf maple grove of the Burman River valley, which lies within the Mowachaht/Muchalaht salmon-park system.
TJ WATT

The village of Gold River, located in the heart of Mowachaht/Muchalaht territory, was built as a forestry community, but the last mill closed in 1999. The salmon-parks strategy will balance economic development with ecology, Mr. Angel said, and some of the funds will help develop those plans. By clearly identifying which lands must be protected, industry will better understand where resource extraction will be allowed, and what kind of activities would be welcomed.

The salmon park is home to black bears like this one near Tahsis.

Based on studies by biologists, the First Nation has determined that 90 per cent of salmon productivity in the region can be protected by setting aside 20 per cent of the watersheds – especially those where glacier-fed rivers offer the greatest climate resiliency.

The provincial government, which awards forestry tenures, has not yet weighed in on the salmon parks. However, Nathan Cullen, BC’s Minister for Land, Water and Resource Stewardship, said that his government needs to endorse IPCAs to reach its conservation targets. “Getting there would be absolutely impossible without willing First Nations partners.”

He believes IPCAs also hold the key to ensuring that this transition can be done without cratering the province’s resource-based economy. Conservation decisions will bring certainty to land that has long been mired in conflict because of unresolved Indigenous claims. First Nations communities have told him, he said, that they will be more open to extraction industries after the areas they have identified for conservation are protected. “The whole point of land-use planning is to lessen the conflict, lessen the legal challenges and increase certainty for investors while protecting more of the province.”

But that process can be expensive. The largest cost associated with the Mowachaht/Muchalaht IPCAs will be the purchase of logging tenures from industry. To implement the plan, the First Nation expects it will need to raise as much as $50-million. “It will cost money because the companies will not just say, ‘Okay, yeah, take our tenure and make a reserve.’ So everyone will need to be compensated,” said Azar Kamran, chief executive officer and administrator for the First Nation.

Western Forest Products, one of those tenure holders in Nootka Sound, is aware of the salmon-parks plan, said Babita Khunkhun, a spokesperson for the company. “While we have not had specific discussions with the Nation since the recent announcement, we work to understand and incorporate the interests of Indigenous communities through open communication and that ongoing commitment will serve to guide us going forward.”

‘We’ve been clear for a number of years now that protecting our old-growth forests is one of our priorities,’ Ms. Dabrusin says.
CHAD HIPOLITO/THE GLOBE AND MAIL

Ottawa has agreed to invest up to $500-million across all projects over the life of the tripartite agreement, with matching funding to come from the province. Philanthropic organizations are also expected to contribute. It took two years to negotiate and now it could take another year to set up the committee.

Julie Dabrusin, parliamentary secretary to Mr. Guilbeault, was one of the brokers. On a recent visit to BC, she visited an old-growth forest where 500-year-old Douglas firs rival the height of the concrete towers of her home riding of Toronto-Danforth.

The trees in Francis/King Regional Park, near Victoria, are already protected, but she said seeing them was a good reminder of the purpose of her assignment, which was to help secure an agreement that would allow the federal Liberal government to achieve its “30 by 30″ commitment.

She acknowledged concerns that BC’s old-growth forests are being logged while the process unfolds. “I think that there is always an urgency to get beyond talking. We’ve been clear for a number of years now that protecting our old-growth forests is one of our priorities.”

Leading Ms. Dabrusin’s old-growth tour was Ken Wu, who heads the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance and has spent decades campaigning for protected areas. Meeting Canada’s conservation targets will be “a monumental undertaking,” he said, but with $1-billion or more, and a framework that puts First Nations in the driver’s seat, the past month has given environmentalists something to celebrate.

“In the coming months and years we’re going to see – I’m certain of it – the biggest protected areas expansion in Canadian history within a province.”

See the original article on the new Salmon Park IPCA here. 

The Guardian: “The nature cure: how time outdoors transforms our memory, imagination and logic”

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November 27, 2023
The Guardian
By Sam Pyrah

See the original article.

Without engaging with natural environments, our brains cease to work well. As the new field of environmental neuroscience proves, exposure to nature isn’t a luxury – it’s a necessity

It’s a grey November day; rain gently pocks the surface of the tidal pools. There is not much to see in this East Sussex nature reserve – a few gulls, a little grebe, a solitary wader on the shore – but already my breathing has slowed to the rhythm of the water lapping the shingle, my shoulders have dropped and I feel imbued with a sense of calm.

I’m far from alone in finding the antidote to modern life in nature. “It’s only when I’m outdoors and attentive to the wild things around me that my mind holds still,” says James Gilbert, an ecologist from Northamptonshire. Despite his job, it is not visits to nature reserves boasting rare species that provide what he describes as a “mental reset” – “simply the everyday encounters I chance upon in my daily life. These touches of wildness freshen my mind, broaden my perspective and lift my spirits.”

Such testimonies to the power of nature are nothing new. What is new is the emerging field of environmental neuroscience, which seeks to explore why – and how – our brains are so profoundly affected by being in nature.

You are probably aware of studies showing that green (vegetated) and blue (moving water) environments are associated with a reduction in stress, improved mood, more positive emotions and decreases in anxiety and rumination. But there is growing evidence that nature exposure also benefits cognitive function – all the processes involved in gaining knowledge and understanding, including perception, memory, reasoning, judgment, imagination and problem-solving. One study found that after just 40 seconds of looking out at a green roof, subjects made fewer mistakes in a test than when they looked at a concrete one.

Dr Marc Berman, director of the Environmental Neuroscience Laboratory at the University of Chicago, taxed subjects’ brains with a test known as the backwards digit-span task, requiring them to repeat back sequences of numbers in reverse order. Then he sent them for a 50-minute walk, in either an urban setting (a town centre) or a nature setting (a park). On their return, they repeated the task. “Performance improved by about 20% when participants had walked in nature, but not when they had walked in an urban environment,” he says.

The brain boost from being in nature goes beyond getting answers right in a test, according to Prof Kathryn Williams, an environmental psychologist at the University of Melbourne. “Research has consistently demonstrated enhanced creativity after immersion in natural environments,” she says. One study found that a four-day hike (with no access to phones or other technology) increased participants’ creativity by 50%. (If you’re wondering how you can put a number on creativity, that study used the Remote Associates Test, widely used as a measure of creative thinking, insight and problem-solving. Subjects are given three words and have to come up with a word that links them. For example, Big, Cottage, Cake = Cheese.)

What might be going on here? According to the biophilia hypothesis popularised by the American sociobiologist EO Wilson, humans function better in natural environments because our brains and bodies evolved in, and with, nature. “Biophilia makes a lot of sense,” says Dr David Strayer, a cognitive neuroscientist who heads the Applied Cognition Laboratory at the University of Utah. “As hunter-gatherers, those who were most attuned to the natural environment were the most likely to survive. But then we built all this infrastructure. We are trying to use the hunter-gatherer brain to live in the highly stressful and demanding modern world.”

It’s not that life as a hunter-gatherer was easy, of course. But, says Strayer, the fight-or-flight response that we evolved to deal with it is ill-suited to the way we live now. “Most of the stress we encounter today does not require a physical response, but still evokes the same physiological reaction – raised cortisol levels, increased heart rate and alertness – which can impact immune and cardiovascular function, as well as memory, mood and attention.”

Exposure to nature activates the parasympathetic nervous system – the branch of the nervous system related to a “resting” state. This instils feelings of calm and wellbeing that enable us to think more clearly and positively, just as I experienced on my harbourside walk.

One recent theory proposes that oxytocin (the “bonding” hormone) may be behind the phenomenon, exerting its powerful antistress and restorative effects when we are in natural settings that we perceive as safe, pleasing, calm and familiar.

But if its capacity to make us “feel better” were the sole pathway through which nature affected the brain, it would only work if you regard being in nature as a positive experience. Those siding with Woody Allen when he said “I love nature; I just don’t want to get any of it on me” would not experience a brain boost. However, research by Berman and others suggests that improvements in cognitive function are not linked to improved mood.

Berman got his subjects to walk at different times of the year. “Even in January, when it was zero degrees outside and people didn’t enjoy the nature walk, they still experienced performance improvements in the test,” he says. “They didn’t need to ‘like’ the nature exposure to reap the cognitive benefits.”

Another explanation for the nature boost is something known as attention restoration theory (ART). Psychologists call the capacity to sustain focus on a specific mental task, ignoring external distractions (such as your phone) and internal ones (such as your rumbling belly), “directed attention”. And according to ART, it is a finite resource.

“The areas of the brain responsible for this kind of attention can become depleted by multitasking and high-stimulation modern environments,” explains Williams. When that happens, we can’t concentrate, we make mistakes and get stuck on problems. “But there is something about nature that engages the brain in a way that’s very undemanding and effortless, giving these areas an opportunity to rest and recover.”

It’s not that natural settings don’t have lots of stimuli, but the attention they capture is indirect and spontaneous – we are drawn by the movement of a bird or the sound of our feet padding on fallen leaves. This gentle attendance to our surroundings is known as “soft fascination”, and while we are immersed in it, directed attention can be restored. Maybe that’s why I often find myself recording voice notes, or tapping ideas into my phone, after spending time in nature.

Excitingly, neuroimaging tools such as electroencephalograms and functional magnetic resonance imaging are helping researchers to glimpse the changes in our brains in real time. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), for example, uses something known as Bold – blood-oxygen-level-dependent imaging – to determine which areas of the brain are most active during exposure to different stimuli. (Like muscles, the more active parts require more oxygenated blood.) Studies have revealed a drop in the Bold signal in the prefrontal cortex (an important brain structure in executive function) during nature exposure, supporting the idea that this part of the brain is “off duty” at the time. It has also been shown that a greater number of brain areas are activated when viewing urban scenes, suggesting more effort is required to process them.

The drawback with fMRI is that it requires you to lie still, ruling out real-life nature experiences – which is why Berman is excited about his newest tool, functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). “We have some idea of what the brain looks like when it is working hard,” he says. “But fNIRS enables us to shine infrared light into the brain of a person as they walk through different environments to see whether it is working harder or easier.”

“We’re not trying to create a nature pill,” Berman insists, pointing to research that shows exposure to “real-world” nature yields greater improvements in mood and aspects of cognitive performance. “We are looking at why we build things the way that we do. Now, it’s all about efficiency. But we could be thinking instead about creating a built environment that elicits the best attention, high levels of wellbeing, cooperation – we could be putting natural elements into streets, offices, schools, homes. And don’t forget that not everybody has access to nature.”

Regardless of access issues, most of us spend very little time in nature. A government survey last year found that a quarter of people hadn’t visited a green or natural space once in the previous 14 days. And yet, as the BMJ reported in 2021, greater contact with nature is associated with better cognition, working memory, spatial memory attention, visual attention, reasoning, fluency, intelligence and childhood intellectual development.

“This growing body of research is demonstrating that we can’t be healthy – that our brains do not work optimally – if we don’t spend time in natural environments,” says Berman. “It’s not a luxury – it’s a necessity.”

How to make the most of nature
Aim for at least 30 minutes. According to cognitive neuroscientist David Strayer, this is the duration needed for measurable benefits to accrue. Longer-term experiences (Strayer talks of the “three-day effect”) have additional benefits.

Forgo the tech. “If you’re focusing on your watch or phone, or wearing headphones, you aren’t engaging with your environment,” says Strayer.

Get your timing right. One study found that the boost to cognition lasted 30 minutes after leaving the natural setting, which may help you plan the best time for mentally demanding work.

Choose your venue. Not all natural environments are equal. “You want to be somewhere pleasant and engaging,” says Prof Kathryn Williams, an environmental psychologist at the University of Melbourne. “A sense of safety is paramount to positive experiences in nature, including attention restoration, stress reduction and mind wandering. A feeling of ‘being away’ – a sense of psychological distance from the things that burden you – is also important.”

Endangered Ecosystems Alliance executive director, Ken Wu, stands in a blue jacket amongst the spectacular yet unprotected ancient forests of the Mossome Grove near Port Renfrew in Pacheedaht territory.

WATCH: BC forest plan draft hailed by conservationists

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November 23, 2023
Global News BC
By Paul Johnson

See this video interview with Endangered Ecosystems Alliance’s Ken Wu, discussing the BC government’s recent “unprecedented leaps forward” over the past month with its release of the draft Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework in tandem with the BC Nature Agreement.

Watch the video here.

It’s being described as a “game changer” in efforts to protect BC’s old-growth forests. As Paul Johnson reports, conservationists are welcoming a draft plan from the provincial government that would not only consider the economic but also the ecological value of our forests.

CBC Radio — “On The Island with Gregor Craigie”: Interview with Ken Wu

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November 16, 2023
CBC Radio: On the Island with Gregor Craigie

Listen to this stellar interview with Endangered Ecosystems Alliance’s Ken Wu, who speaks about the significance of the BC government’s recently released draft Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework.

Listen to the full interview, or view the transcript below:

Gregor Craigie:
Another piece of the province’s plan to protect endangered old-growth forests was announced yesterday. The new draft Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework follows last month’s creation of a $300 million fund to purchase and protect natural spaces as parks or protected areas.

BC Water, Land and Resource Stewardship Minister Nathan Cullen says the latest initiatives will help the province protect 30% of its land base by the year 2030. For more on the significance of the biodiversity framework, we’re joined by Ken Wu, Executive Director of the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance. Ken, good morning.

Ken Wu:
Thanks for having me on.

Gregor:
Thanks for joining us. First of all, what exactly is a Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework? It’s a long title. And how is it a significant development for delivering the government’s promise to protect old growth?

Ken:
So this is a potentially revolutionary game-changer for conservation in Canada. Ff it comes out right, it will essentially target protection and conservation measures for the most endangered and least represented ecosystems in British Columbia. Ecosystem-based protection targets are what have been lacking not only in British Columbia but across most of the world. So it’ll essentially save the big trees instead of primarily saving alpine and sub alpine areas with small trees or no trees, as it is typically being the history of protected areas in BC.

It’s a huge game changer if it comes out right when it’s finalized in a few months.

Gregor:
So if I hear you correctly, Ken, it sounds like it’s recognizing quality rather than just quantity. You’re not just counting old trees but looking at the the quality and the age and location, and so on, of them.

Ken:
That’s right. So basically, BC has got a target to protect 30% of its land area by 2030. But if you don’t have specificity for the diversity of ecosystems with protection targets for them, then what happens, what has always been happening, and which will continue to happen, if this doesn’t land right, is saving the areas with low to no timber values.

The dominant paradigm, the paradigm that is supposed to be shifted as a result of the government’s Old Growth Strategic Review panel. The dominant paradigm has basically been to minimize impacts on the available timber supply for the logging industry from any conservation measures.

This [framework] turns [the old paradigm] on its head. It basically says that first, you have to conserve and protect the diversity of ecosystems that also includes the the areas that have been most coveted by industry. If the government does this, it is really a huge game changer.

Gregor:
Ok. And how does this draft framework fit in potentially with last month’s announcement from the province of this $300 million for conservation financing for endangered ecosystems?

Ken:
So the combination of the province’s $300 million conservation financing announcement with 1.1 billion of the Federal Provincial Nature Agreement is basically the fuel; it powers up the expansion of the protected area system by supporting First Nations in their initiatives for Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas (IPCA) (is a bit of a mouthful) as well as for land acquisition for a diversity of approaches to protect ecosystems.

It basically means not only are you going to expand protected areas but you’ll place them in the places, hopefully that are the most impacted by industry and the least represented in the existing protected areas system.

Gregor:
So it targets protection to where it really needs to go, and forgive me if it’s obvious Ken, but has the work of identifying where needs to be targeted first and, you know, prioritizing those targets — has that been done?

Ken:
It’s probably been done through the Technical Advisory Panel, that’s the government’s science panel that it struck up a couple of years ago to identify the most at-risk old growth, but that’s an old-growth focused panel.

We want to make sure the province doesn’t jettison its results because there are some in the bureaucracy that try to creep away from that. But there needs to be a bigger set of analysis that has to be done. [The government is] going to be appointing a Chief Biodiversity Officer who will then strike up science teams, Traditional Ecological Knowledge committees, and First Nations committees to then build targets to span the diversity of ecosystems.

Now, the issue is whether or not it will have a fine enough filter because if [the government] doesn’t target ecosystems, specifically enough there, then you still have the loopholes where you can basically save the bogs instead of the big trees where you can still save the high elevations and the low elevation. So it’s got to be fine filter enough to capture all the ecosystems including forest productivity gradients, big trees versus medium trees versus small trees, depending on the soil and the climate. And it’s got to be large scale enough based on the latest science and conservation biology that says you’ve got to protect quite a lot of these landscapes, these ecosystems, to maintain all the species and the processes, predator-prey relationships, hydrological, watershed integrity.

Gregor:
All these type of things you mentioned — loopholes — are there examples whether it’s here on the island or elsewhere in the province where loopholes and arrangements like the Old Growth Management Areas have been exploited to allow for more logging of endangered trees?

Ken:
So this keeps coming up, right? So basically, there’s two basic sets of ways you can save or safeguard ecosystems. One of them are the legislated protected areas, the hard protected areas and they’re bigger typically. So that’s like provincial parks. Provincial conservancies is a newer designation that is congruent with First Nations’ subsistence uses, co-management, and rights and title. So those are the big [designations] that exclude logging, mining oil and gas.

Then you’ve got a whole forest reserve conservation reserve labyrinth, Old Growth Management Areas, Wildlife Habitat Areas, visual quality objectives, riparian management zones — all these different kinds of designations. Some of them are weak and tenuous old growth management areas.

You can take out pieces under industry, then lobby and log those. And it happens all the time, by the way, just like like it happens hundreds, probably thousands of times across the province. So it’s a common occurrence and we’ve dealt with it in the Port Renfrew area over the years.

Gregor:
And so the devil is clearly in the details, but if it does live up to its potential, what you hope is, is coming. What do you think it would mean for some of the more contentious old-growth logging areas, like the Fairy Creek situation?

Ken:
So basically, it has to be obviously stitched together with the conservation financing mechanism. These can’t be two parallel policies that are not connected, right?

So, that’s a key thing to make sure, is that basically all this money now to power the expansion of protected areas is guided by ecosystem-based targets to make sure the deployment of those funds is [allocated] to get the most endangered and least represented ecosystems, and that could result in the protection of Fairy Creek and other high-productivity and most at-risk old growth across BC.

But in the end, it’s really important, [and it’s something] that the environmental movement doesn’t seem to quite grasp, which is that the BC government can’t unilaterally just “save the old growth.” Because of successive court rulings, not only does it require First Nations’ consent, but First Nations’ shared decision making in any legislated land-use changes on their territories is required if you’re going to save old growth and endangered ecosystems. And so the protection moves at the speed of the local First Nations whose territory it is on.

The funding can facilitate that because many First Nations have a lack of capacity and also a dependency on old growth timber industry, jobs and revenues. The conservation financing can support alternative industries while at the same time paving the path for new Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas. So all of it can work together.

We don’t have it yet, by the way, the Biodiversity and Ecosystem Framework is high level, it doesn’t have the legislation yet. It’s not official.

There’s a few more months yet of public input, but we are going to push hard because if we can combine the two: the funding to power protected areas  expansion and the ecosystem-based targets to save the most endangered areas, then we will have a world-class protected-areas system, and BC will lead the world in conservation policy there.

Gregor:
Are you optimistic at this point, Ken, that that will happen in the coming months?

Ken:
It always takes work, right? Premier Eby, I want to give him thanks, I want to give him crystal clear thanks that he’s moving things forward much quicker than any other previous premier has. And he’s a lot bolder, along with Steven Guilbeault, federally, the Environment Minister.

It is fueling the expansion of the protected areas system across Canada. And we will see, I’m certain, in the ensuing months and years, a massive unprecedented expansion of the protected areas system in BC. So I’m optimistic.

There’s going to be an election in the fall of 2024 and they will want to have this come out, I think, if they don’t want to bleed support to the Greens and this is something that I get a sense that Eby, personally, wants to make this happen.

Gregor:
Well, Ken, I appreciate you taking the time.

Ken:
It’s good to talk to you again.

Gregor:
Thanks very much.

Ken:
Hey, thanks for having me on again.

Gregor:
Ken Wu is executive director of the Ancient Forests Alliance. It’s 22 minutes after seven. This is “On The Island.”

‘Potential paradigm shift’: Activists are hopeful for BC’s new environmental protections

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November 15, 2023
Victoria Buzz
By Curtis Blandy

See the original article.

BC’s government is trying to implement further steps to protect and preserve the province’s at-risk environment through a new biodiversity and ecosystem health framework (BEHF).

Right now the BEHF is just a draft proposal, but Nathan Cullen, the Minister of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship, is hopeful that it will become legislation and allow for the preservation of BC’s well-known natural landscapes.

“People in BC share a deep connection to nature, from our ancient forests and diverse wildlife, to our coastal waters and mountain ranges,” said Cullen.

“Together, we are charting the next steps for conserving BC’s rich biodiversity and healthy ecosystems that support us all.”

Earlier this month the Province announced it was aiming to protect 30% of BC’s old-growth forests to align with and honour the commitments they made based on the recommendations from the Old Growth Strategic Review.

Although the BEHF is vague in its current stages, conservation activists are applauding the government’s steps towards preservation and protection of BC’s old-growth.

However, these groups warn that “the devil will be in the details.”

“If this framework results in science-based targets to protect the full diversity of ecosystems in BC, including factoring in ‘forest productivity distinctions’ to protect the classic old-growth stands that spawned the ‘War in the Woods,’ then it would up-end the traditional conservation model in BC and across much of the world which seeks to minimize impacts of conservation on industry,” said Ken Wu, Executive Director of the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance.

“In BC the dominant paradigm has long focused on minimizing the impacts of conservation on the available timber supply for logging, thus emphasizing the protection of alpine, subalpine, far north, and bog landscapes with low to no timber values.”

They say that it will take ecosystem-based targets for the BEHF to be effective.

“Without ecosystem-based targets, it’s like sending in a fire brigade to hose down the non-burning homes, while those on fire are largely ignored,” Wu added.

The Endangered Ecosystems Alliance and the Ancient Forest Alliance both say they would like to see the government approach this endeavour with integrity and adequate funding.

See the original article here.

The Narwhal: A billion dollars for nature in BC as long-awaited agreement is signed

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November 3, 2023
By Ainslie Cruickshank
The Narwhal

See the original article.

The tripartite nature agreement comes with new and old funding to protect old-growth forests, species at risk.

Federal, provincial and First Nations leaders gathered against the backdrop of Burrard Inlet Friday to announce a long-awaited nature agreement that promises further protections for old-growth forests and at-risk species.

The agreement, which runs through March 2030, comes with $1 billion in joint federal-provincial funding — some of which has already been announced — including $50 million from Ottawa to permanently protect 1.3 million hectares of “high priority” old-growth forests in BC.

Premier David Eby called it a “historic partnership.”

“We are so excited because it will enable us to fast track our old-growth protection work, it will enable us to protect habitat for species that are at-risk in our province,” he said.

The agreement ​​— signed by the provincial and federal governments and the First Nations Leadership Council — also includes commitments to support Indigenous-led conservation initiatives, conserve enough old forest habitat to support the recovery of 250 spotted owls and restore 140,000 hectares of degraded habitat within the next two years.

“This is a major, major agreement on protecting nature,” Minister of Environment and Climate Change Steven Guilbeault told The Narwhal ahead of Friday’s announcement.

“I think people will look at this agreement and say, ‘OK, this is how it needs to be done going forward now in Canada,’ ” he said. “It’s nature, it’s conservation, it’s restoration, but it’s also about reconciliation.”

Recovery of endangered species, such as caribou and spotted owls, is one of the key goals of the new nature agreement. Photo: Ryan Dickie / The Narwhal

The governments have committed to working with Indigenous Rights holders to implement the agreement in a way that’s consistent with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

“Fundamentally, we need to be a part of the decision-making process,” Terry Teegee, the Regional Chief of the British Columbia Assembly of First Nations, said during Friday’s announcement.

“We have a sacred duty to do our utmost to protect the land, to nurture the land, and this agreement serves that purpose,” Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs said. “It’s the right thing to do for our grandchildren and future generations.”

Conservation groups welcome new agreement to protect nature amid unprecedented biodiversity decline

Ken Wu, the executive director of the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance, called the new agreement a “huge leap forward to supercharge the expansion of the protected area system in British Columbia.”

Dedicated funding is crucial for enabling Indigenous-led conservation initiatives, he said.

But one thing he will be watching for moving forward are ecosystem-based protection targets, to ensure conservation of the highest risk ecosystems.

The agreement comes at a critical time for nature globally. Biodiversity is declining with unprecedented speed and scientists warn the world could be in the midst of the sixth mass extinction event. One million species are at risk of disappearing, according to a 2019 global assessment. Others have already been lost.

In Canada alone, 5,000 species — such as the western sandpiper, blue whale, eastern prickly-pear cactus and the Vancouver marmot — are at some risk of extinction, according to a comprehensive survey of the country’s biodiversity.

Habitat destruction from clearcut logging, mining, oil and gas extraction and expansive urban development is a driving force behind biodiversity loss, but climate change, invasive species and over-hunting and fishing are also major contributors.

Under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework signed at COP15 in December 2022, Canada and 195 other countries agreed to take urgent action to stem nature losses, including by conserving 30 per cent of land and waters by 2030.

But Canada would be hard-pressed to meet its commitments without the support of provinces, territories and Indigenous nations.

Through nature agreements, the federal government is offering major funding injections for provinces and territories that agree to stronger conservation action. The first, a $20.6 million agreement with the Yukon, was announced at COP15.

The BC agreement comes after three years of negotiations between the federal and provincial government and one year of trilateral negotiations with the First Nations Leadership Council, which comprises the British Columbia Assembly of First Nations, the Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs and the First Nations Summit.

Provincial funding for the agreement comes through existing programs and initiatives, including modernized land use planning, forest landscape planning and the new conservation financing mechanism announced last week. At least $104 million of federal funding for restoration is being allocated through the federal government’s initiative to plant two billion trees over ten years.

Jens Wieting, a senior forest and climate campaigner at Sierra Club BC, said the BC nature agreement has “all the ingredients to speed up progress” towards meeting the 2030 targets, but “it must translate to change on the ground.”

‘Nothing else can put this new agreement to the test as the spotted owl can’

BC has made significant commitments to both protect 30 per cent of land in the province by 2030 and also to transform the way decisions about land and natural resources are made.

But internal government records show the province also saw the nature agreement as a way to avoid direct federal intervention to protect at-risk species. Though it rarely uses it, the federal government has authority under the Species At Risk Act to intervene in provincial land use decisions to protect at-risk species and has been urged to do so in the case of spotted owls.

Spotted owls were listed as endangered under the act 20 years ago and yet the old-growth forests they depend on are still logged today.

Guilbeault recommended the federal government issue an emergency order this year to protect critical spotted owl habitat, but the BC government lobbied against it and ultimately the federal cabinet chose not to issue the order.

The new nature agreement commits the governments to finalizing a spotted owl recovery strategy and protecting enough of the raptor’s old-growth forest habitat to one day support 250 owls in the wild. Additionally, it lays out commitments to increase capacity for BC’s captive breeding program and efforts to control barred owl numbers.

“We’re putting money on the table, the BC government is putting money on the table,” Guilbeault said. “I think that’s a significant change from where we were 20, 10 or even five years ago,” he said.

Following the press conference, Spuzzum First Nation Chief James Hobart said “nothing else can put this new agreement to the test as the spotted owl can.”

“They’re really important to us,” he said. “When we see a spotted owl, sometimes we think of it as somebody that’s passed on.”

“When you only see one around, it’s not really a good indicator of our messengers,” he said.

The spotted owl, he said, should determine where logging can and can’t happen. And if a First Nation says it doesn’t want logging in its territory, it should be “a no go zone,” Hobart said. “We should not have to have that discussion more than once,” he said.

‘Legal gaps’ leave nature vulnerable as BC develops new biodiversity policy framework

Alongside efforts to recover endangered species such as the spotted owl, the nature agreement lays out commitments to address threats to species early on by identifying and protecting critical habitat to prevent crisis-level population declines.

These early actions could help avoid the need to list species under the federal Species at Risk Act, the agreement says.

That’s a concern for Charlotte Dawe, conservation and policy campaigner for the Wilderness Committee.

“If we’re not listing species that need to be listed, that’s an issue,” she said. Those decisions should be science-based, not determined by whether the government is already taking recovery actions or by potential impacts on industry, she said.

One of the long-standing conservation challenges in BC is the piecemeal approach the province has taken to protecting at-risk species.

Conservation groups say it’s not working. A report last year from the Wilderness Committee and Sierra Club BC found “huge legal gaps” are driving species loss and urged the province to develop a new law that prioritizes ecosystem health and protects species at risk.

The Forest Practices Board, meanwhile, showed BC is failing to use even the tools it already has at its disposal to protect at-risk species’ critical habitat in a report released this summer. The report found, for instance, the province hasn’t updated its legal list of species at risk since 2006, meaning it can’t use tools under the Forest and Range Practices Act to protect numerous species scientists consider to be under threat.

BC has committed to overhauling the way it manages land and is working with First Nations to develop a new biodiversity and ecosystem health framework, a draft of which is expected to be released for public consultation this year.

But critics worry the promised transformation is taking too long to materialize, as old-growth forests continue to fall.

And while the new nature agreement outlines ambitious commitments, Victoria Watson, a lawyer with the environmental law charity Ecojustice, notes the agreement itself isn’t legally binding.

“Law and regulations that hold Canada and BC accountable to some of the commitments that have been outlined in the agreement are really essential,” she said. As is a “willingness on the part of Canada and BC to really share authority on the ground with First Nations.”

In the short-term, Watson said she’ll be looking for “immediate action on the ground,” including new old-growth logging deferrals.

Guilbeault said old-growth forests were “at the heart” of nature agreement discussions.

Finalizing the agreement is an “extremely positive step,” he said, one that should see tens of millions of dollars in federal funding actually flowing to the BC government and First Nations to support conservation.

“My hope,” Guilbeault said, is “especially on species at risk and old-growth that we can move as quickly as possible because obviously it’s a matter of some urgency.”

Updated Nov. 3, 2023, at 2:55 p.m. PT: This story has been updated to include quotes from the nature agreement announcement and reactions to it.

See the original article.

 

CHEK News: BC signs ‘historic’ $1B agreement to protect lands and waters

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November 3, 2023
By Mary Griffin
CHEK News

Read the original article and watch the video here.

It’s described as an historic agreement for BC.

It’s a $1 billion agreement to protect 30 per cent of BC’s lands and waters by 2030, according to Steve Guilbeault, Federal Minister of Environment and Climate Change of Canada.

“This may be the single most significant nature plan in the history of Canada,” he said at an announcement Friday.

Ottawa is contributing $500 million, with $50 million reserved to protect 4,000 square kilometres of old-growth forest, and another $104 million to restore the habitat of species at risk.

The provincial government’s share is more than $560 million.

Premier David Eby said the agreement will enable the provincial government to fast-track our old-growth protection work.

“This is a paradigm shift in our province about protecting ecosystems, about recognizing the integrated nature of what we want to protect on the land, and how we use the land to make sure it’s there for generations to come,” he said Friday.

TJ Watt, co-founder of the Ancient Forest Alliance, said this agreement could lead to the permanent deferments of logging on Vancouver Island areas in Fairy Creek, and the Walbran Valley.

“This level of funding, again, can help support First Nations that are in the driver’s seat in deciding what old-growth forests get protected in their territory, move some of those temporary deferrals to long time protection measures,” Watt said.

The agreement comes at a critical time, according to Regional Chief, Terry Teegee, BC Assembly of First Nations.

“We’ve experienced this past year, unprecedented drought, unprecedented wildfire season in Canada’s history, and the province’s history. And certainly part of that is conserving biodiverse areas in our respective territories, and in British Columbia,” Teegee said.

Grand Chief Stewart Phillips, Union of BC Indian Chiefs, said First Nations will oversee the conservation efforts.

“We have a sacred duty to do our utmost duty to protect the land, to nurture the land,” he said. “And this agreement serves that purpose. What I like about the agreement is tripartite.”

To reach its target, 100,000 square kilometres of land must be added to the 20 percent of the province already protected.

Read the original article.

 

Endangered Ecosystems Alliance Executive Director, Ken Wu, stands beside a giant Sitka spruce tree in an old-growth forest west of Lake Cowichan in Ditidaht territory.

The Georgia Strait: “Conservation financing is a game-changer for BC’s old-growth forests”

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October 31, 2023
The Georgia Strait – Op-Ed by Ken Wu.
See the original article.

Last week, BC Premier David Eby announced a new $300 million “conservation financing mechanism.” Based on a startup contribution of $150 million from the Province and $150 million from the BC Parks Foundation (the charitable partner of the BC Parks agency), the fund will support First Nations communities to establish new Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas (IPCAs). This puts BC on the verge of a major protected areas expansion over the next few months and years to reach its minimum projection target of 30 per cent by 2030. Currently about 15 per cent of BC is in protected areas.

BC’s old-growth forests have spawned one of the most passionate and pervasive ecosystem-protection movements in world history, and for good reason. They contain some of the largest and oldest living organisms that have ever existed in Earth’s history: forest giants that can live to 2,000 years old and grow wider than a living room. Old-growth forests are vital to support unique and endangered species, climate stability, clean water, wild salmon, First Nations cultures, and BC’s multi-billion dollar tourism industry. They have unique characteristics that are not replicated by the ensuing second-growth tree plantations that they are being replaced with and that are logged every 50 to 80 years on BC’s coast, never to become old-growth again.

Well over 80 per cent of the original, productive old-growth forests (sites where most big trees and timber values reside) have already been logged, and over five million hectares of big trees, rare (by ecosystem type) trees, and the very oldest of old-growth forests remain unprotected in BC; 2.6 million hectares have been identified as the top priorities for logging deferrals by the Province’s appointed panels.

I’ve spent the last 33 years of my life with a continuous focus on protecting old-growth forests in BC, engaged in just about every tactic in the toolbox of environmental activism at one time or another. But over the past six years I’ve focused the vast majority of my time on two key policies that are indispensable for protecting old-growth forests and BC’s diverse ecosystems: conservation financing and ecosystem-based protection targets. These are two fundamental game-changers for stopping old-growth and ecosystem destruction in BC.

Conservation financing is funding for Indigenous communities linked to the establishment of new protected areas and conservation initiatives. In BC, the Province cannot unilaterally establish protected areas and “just save the old-growth” on Crown/unceded First Nations lands; the support of local First Nations governments is a legal necessity in their territories. The establishment of protected areas and deferrals for logging move at the speed of the local First Nations whose territories it is; so, the BC Government’s policies and funding can either facilitate or hinder the abilities of First Nations to protect ecosystems. Conservation financing is a vital enabling condition that can greatly facilitate and speed up the protection of old-growth forests.

Those who believe that the BC Government can unilaterally “just save the old-growth forests” across BC without the consent of the local First Nations (200 different communities) in their unceded territories continue to hold a long outdated and simplistic model of conservation in BC, and therefore fail to understand the centrality of conservation financing.

That is: First Nations communities are in the driver’s seat for new protected areas in their unceded territories. The BC Government must provide the vehicle—the policy framework and the funding—for First Nations to drive to where we all need to go: the protection of the diversity of ecosystems in BC.

Conservation financing is key to meet the needs of Indigenous communities for sustainable economic development alternatives to their old-growth logging dependencies. Many or most BC First Nations have an economic dependency fostered by successive BC governments on forestry, including on old-growth logging, and require support to develop sustainable alternatives in ecotourism, clean energy, sustainable seafood, non-timber forest products like wild mushrooms, and other businesses. They also need funding to develop the capacity to undertake land-use planning, mapping, engagement of community members, stakeholder and resource licensees, and stewardship and management jobs in new protected areas.

Conservation financing thus paves the path and is the indispensable enabler for new protected-areas establishment in BC; without it, it would simply be impossible to undertake the large-scale protection of the most contested landscapes with the highest resource values in BC.

On BC’s central and north coasts (such as the Great Bear Rainforest), $120 million in conservation financing from the Province, Federal Government, and conservation groups in 2006 resulted in the protection of almost 1.8 million hectares of land (about two-thirds the size of Vancouver Island), the creation of over 100 businesses, and 1,000 permanent jobs in First Nations communities—and significantly raised the average household income in numerous communities.

The $300 million that has kick-started BC’s new conservation financing fund will over time grow with additional provincial, federal, and philanthropic funding, possibly or likely into the billions over the next several years.

Does conservation financing mean that all problems with BC’s old-growth policies are now solved? Of course not. But it’s an indispensable part of the solution.

Now our battle shifts to several key gaps or loopholes in BC’s old-growth and protected-areas policies.

First, the new conservation financing mechanism needs to be tied to “ecosystem-based targets”—that is, protection targets developed by a chief scientist and Traditional Ecological Knowledge committees that ensure that all ecosystems, including the most endangered and contested landscapes such as old-growth forests with the greatest timber values, are protected. Without ecosystem-based targets to guide conservation financing, we’ll see again an emphasis on protecting treeless alpine tundra and subalpine areas with little to no timber values; this largely skirts around saving the big timber in the biologically-rich lowlands that will still get logged. All native ecosystems need and deserve protection—but an emphasis must be placed on the most endangered and least protected ecosystems to tackle the extinction and climate crises happening right now. Potentially, ecosystem-based protection targets may happen via BC’s forthcoming Biodiversity and Ecosystem Health Framework. The Province already has a head start with the Technical Advisory Panel’s identification of the grandest, rarest, and oldest old-growth forests recommended for logging deferrals—recommendations that some bureaucrats seem intent on tossing out now.

Secondly, the province must fund First Nations communities to undertake old-growth logging deferrals in order to help offset their lost logging revenues. This lack of funding for First Nations is the primary barrier to getting the full 2.6 million hectares of the most at-risk old-growth identified by the Technical Advisory Panel deferred from logging. By way of example, a “solutions-space” fund was used successfully in Clayoquot Sound to enable the greatest stands of old-growth to remain while First Nations undertook land use and protected-areas planning.

Thirdly, we’re watching with great concern as the Province might be looking to establish new “flexitarian” designations: tenuous or fake “protected areas.” These types of “protections” are embodied in several existing conservation regulations in BC such as Old-Growth Management Areas with moveable boundaries, and some types of Wildlife Habitat Areas where commercial logging often still takes place. Instead, Provincial Conservancies and several designations simply termed “Protected Areas” in BC are much stronger. They exclude commercial logging, mining, and oil and gas development, and were co-developed by First Nations people to protect their subsistence rights to hunt, fish, forage, and harvest individual old-growth cedars for cultural purposes (totem poles, dugout canoes, masks, etc.), and ensure First Nations co-management to protect their rights and title.

Fourthly, thousands of hectares of some of the finest old-growth forests have been excluded from the roster of priority deferral areas due to data errors. The Province has thus far forbidden the addition of misidentified stands to the list, yet is removing thousands of hectares of misidentified sites that were included (as in: they only allow for the subtraction, not the addition, of misidentified stands from deferral areas due to their mistakes).

So, there is still a lot to do to protect old-growth forests. But make no mistake: the conservation financing mechanism is a huge victory for ecosystems and communities.

Ken Wu is the executive director of the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance and was the former co-founder and executive director of the Ancient Forest Alliance and the executive director of the Wilderness Committee’s Victoria chapter. He has been working to protect old-growth forests for over 30 years in BC.

The Times Colonist: BC’s $300M old-growth fund puts First Nations ‘in the driver’s seat’

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October 26, 2023
Times Colonist
By Stefan Labbé

$300-million investment aims to save BC’s old-growth forests by offering First Nations sustainable economic alternatives to industrial logging.

The BC government and BC Parks Foundation have teamed up to provide $300 million to protect old-growth forests across the province — a move environmental groups have described as a critical step in turning local economies away from unsustainable logging.

Praise for the new green funding came from all sides. Ken Wu, executive director of Endangered Ecosystems Alliance, said the new fund will put First Nations “in the driver’s seat.”

“If you don’t have the funding for the nations… it’s like asking them to jettison their primary source of revenues and jobs,” said Wu.

“It’s the fuel that will actually allow old growth to get saved.”

On the coast, the BC government defines old-growth trees as those more than 250 years old, while in the Interior, the designation depends on the type of forest and can range from more than 140 years to more than 250 years old. Such old-growth forests make up roughly 20 per cent of BC’s forests, according to the province.

Under a new conservation financing mechanism, the money will go toward building alternative economies so First Nations can build revenue outside the harvesting of old-growth trees. That could include anything from ecotourism, clean energy projects and sustainable seafood operations to non-timber forest products like wild mushrooms and jobs managing new protected areas, Wu said.

Earlier Thursday, Premier David Eby said conserving nature is “one of the most important things we can do to protect against the worst effects of climate change.”

Terry Teegee, a board member of the BC Parks Foundation, said many nations are looking for alternatives to transform jobs into a sustainable economy.

“First Nations have always believed that if we take care of nature, it will take care of us,” said Teegee, who is also a regional chief with the BC Assembly of First Nations.

“This funding will help support nations who have a vision of abundance in their territories. That will benefit everyone.”

The announcement was also lauded by other environmental groups.

“This conservation financing mechanism puts major wind in the sails for the protection of old-growth forests in BC,” added TJ Watt, a campaigner and photographer with the Ancient Forest Alliance.

Torrance Coste, national forest and climate campaigner for the Wildness Committee, said the money was one of the “missing ingredients” in protecting old-growth forests in BC, but that the province has yet to “stand up to logging corporations.”

Linda Coady, president of the BC Council of Forest Industries, said it supported the new fund, describing it as a “new and innovative BC-based approach.”

“These last three years have been challenging for the BC forest sector since the November 2021 provincial announcement to defer old-growth logging. While temporary, the uncertainty about the future of the deferral areas impacts forest sector jobs and communities across BC,” the industry group, which represents some of BC’s biggest forestry companies, said in a statement.

The conservation financing mechanism will be managed by an oversight committee independent of the BC government, according to the Ministry of Forests.

It is meant to work alongside forest landscape plans meant to establish new objectives around how to manage old-growth trees, climate change, wildfire risk and biodiversity. Plans under that framework have been confirmed in the Bulkley Valley, 100 Mile House, Williams Lake and Vancouver Island.

This year, the BC government pledged to protect 30 per cent of BC’s land base by 2030. But just how it will do that has not been clear. The latest announcement offers a long-term source of money Wu says will grow as it’s matched through crowd-sourcing, and federal, provincial and philanthropic funding agreements still under negotiation.

Anyone interested in contributing to the fund can do so through the BC Parks Foundation.

Wu, who has been one of the leading advocates of the funding scheme since 2017, says there remain at least three big gaps in how the province intends to protect its oldest and most vulnerable forest ecosystems.

First, he said the conservation financing mechanism has yet to be tied to specific ecosystem-based targets, which would ensure the most endangered and least represented ecosystems are protected. Consider big-treed valley bottoms, he said. It’s a lot harder to protect them than a sparsely treed alpine area.

“Without ecosystem-based targets, it’s like sending in the fire crews to hose down all the non-burning homes while the houses on fire get ignored,” Wu said.

A second gap, according to Wu, is a lack of money to support First Nations economic activities while old-growth deferrals are in place over the next couple of years. Without that, he said there’s no room to figure out what to do next.

Third, Wu pointed to the province’s failure to uphold standards for the areas it chooses to protect. His worry is that it could lead to loopholes where protected forests still face unsustainable logging.

“The concern here is that the province may be looking at flexitarian protected-area standards — sort of like a vegetarian who still eats chicken and pork and beef,” he said.

Despite the long road ahead, Wu remained hopeful.

“This is a big lead forward. Let’s make no mistake: it’s a great day.”

See the orginal article.