News Coverage

Here's a new Canadian Press article about our Chinese-language Ancient Forest Tours, which aims to engage the half a million Chinese speakers in the Vancouver region to diversify and broaden the movement to protect old-growth forests, which in recent times now also includes businesses and chambers of commerce, unions and forestry workers, local governments in the UBCM and AVICC, and naturalist clubs across the province calling for old-growth protection.

Here is today's Vancouver Sun article about the Chinese-Language Ancient Forest Tours program that we're developing. Volunteer educators who we are training about old-growth ecology and conservation issues will be doing the tours starting in Stanley Park at dates to be announced. Note that the tours are also open to those who are interested in learning Mandarin or Cantonese.

Check out this excellent summary opinion piece about BC's endangered old-growth forests by diverse authors from labor, business, First Nations, enviro-group & science.

Pick up a copy of British Columbia magazine, which features an article by Hans Temmegai about the endangered old-growth forests of Vancouver Island and the Ancient Forest Alliance's campaign to protect them. See spectacular photos by the AFA's TJ Watt!

Check out the Vancouver Sun article about the Union of BC Municipalities' vote yesterday on a resolution asking the provincial government to end old-growth logging on Vancouver Island. See the brutal photo (by the AFA's TJ Watt) of the clearcut liquidation of what was once some of the grandest old-growth forests on Earth in the Klanawa Valley near the West Coast Trail.

Here's an article about the Union of BC Municipalities' fantastic resolution calling on the province to amend the old Vancouver Island Land Use Plan to protect the remaining old-growth forests.

This is a big deal: The Vancouver Sun editorial board is calling on the BC Liberal government to show some actual leadership and chart a new course of policies regarding the fate of our old-growth forests as conflicts escalate in places like the Sunshine Coast and Vancouver Island! While we don't agree with all of the sentiments they've expressed, the main fact that BC's largest newspaper recognizes that the status quo of old-growth liquidation is ramping up conflict and uncertainty in the forest industry and requires government leadership in the lead-up to a provincial election next May puts big pressure on the BC Liberal government to change course.
They write:
"There is a legitimate discussion to be had about the value of old-growth forests, about whether what remains on the South Coast and Vancouver Island is sufficiently protected, about the extent to which the remaining inventory should be protected, and about resource jobs and the rights of companies to do legal business. Surely, however, there is also a clear role for the provincial government, which has duties of both environmental stewardship and resource management, to serve as an intermediary in such conflicts by providing clear, science-based, arm’s-length evidence as the foundation for an even-handed conversation and to help the two groups whose interests it represents to find common ground. More leadership and less lethargy from Victoria, please."

Check it out! The Walrus Magazine has a feature about Big Lonely Doug, Canada's 2nd largest Douglas-fir tree, the forestry worker Dennis Cronin who decided to leave him standing, and the battle for old-growth forests on Vancouver Island! Photos by the Ancient Forest Alliance's TJ Watt!

Check it out! New Zealand's largest newspaper has an article about the Ancient Forest Alliance, the importance of old-growth forests for the tourism economy of Port Renfrew, and the campaigns to protect old-growth forests including the Central Walbran Valley.