040OEC’s This Week in Trees

There’s 34 new tree articles from British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, California, Montana, Arizona, South Dakota, Wyoming, Illinois, Nebraska, Kentucky, Florida, USA, Canada, Finland, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Honduras, China, Borneo, Indonesia, Philippines and Australia.

British Columbia:

1) Some continue to claim the proposed land use agreements to protect B.C.’s Central and North Coast — also known as the Great Bear Rainforest — and the islands of Haida Gwaii don’t go far enough. Others think it goes too far. As 12 first nations who live in these regions, our traditional territory, and who have 8,000 years of on-the-ground management experience, we believe those who make those claim fail to consider one critical question. How do we integrate the needs of natural systems with the needs of the people who depend upon them for their livelihoods and way of life? To be successful, conservation must be sustainable, both ecologically and economically. The coastal land use agreements, currently awaiting cabinet approval, do both. In these agreements, the total size of protected areas would be quadrupled to secure many of its most sensitive and intact valleys and islands. This will be more than seven million acres of area protected from logging on the Central and North Coast and Haida Gwaii. When approved, it will be the largest temperate rainforest protection package in Canadian history. The agreements also represent the first effort to apply ecosystem-based management on all areas outside the protected areas. This amounts to re-engineering an entire regional economy, tuning it to measurable indicators of ecological health and human well-being. We are supported by Greenpeace, ForestEthics, the Sierra Club of Canada B.C. Chapter, the Rainforest Action Network, the Nature Conservancy and others. We are proud to support these agreements and are working with the British Columbia government to develop legal and legislative tools to make them a reality. Art Sterritt is executive director of the Coastal First Nations of the Turning Point Initiative Society. Guujaaw is the president of the Council of Haida Nation.
http://www.canada.com/vancouver/vancouversun/news/editorial/index.html

2) Environmentalists hand-delivered almost 1,000 letters to the legislature Saturday, calling on Premier Gordon Campbell to increase protected forest areas, ban raw log exports and slow the sale of Crown lands on Vancouver Island. The mass mail drop was called a “gift-giving rally” by the Western Canada Wilderness Committee, which organized more than 100 protesters from groups such as the Friends of Clayoquot Sound and Youbou Timberless Society. Saturday’s protest crowd waved signs and chanted during the walk from Centennial Square to the legislature just after noon. The WCWC brought a red Canada Post box labelled “Forest Protection Mailbox” in which protesters deposited their letters. Organizers also brought an oversized pair of black cardboard glasses so Campbell could read every letter, a set of large ears so he could “better listen to the public” and a green heart so, as Wu said, “He can care about nature and other living things.” http://www.canada.com/vancouver/vancouversun/news/editorial/index.html

3) “The BC government has created 37 new provincial parks!” blared taxpayer-funded TV ads before the last provincial election. “Golly, when did that happen? Where are these 37 newly-created parks?” I thought to myself. “I must not be paying enough attention to wilderness issues.” It turns out that these 37 “new” parks were in fact already protected by the former NDP government as part of the Okanagan, Shuswap, and Skeena Land Use Plans between 1999 to 2001. The BC Liberals simply renamed the “protected areas” as “parks”, thus misleading the public into believing that they actually protected 37 previously endangered wild areas. Sneaky! But sneaky or not, it’s revealing that the BC Liberals find it important to convince the public that they’ve been busy creating new parks, when in fact park creation has virtually ground to a halt since the Campbell government took office. It shows that the voting public of BC loves our parks and wants more of them. The eco-tourism industry has exploded over the past decade here, as is evident by the proliferation of eco-tourism brochures on the BC Ferries ships enticing tourists to watch the whales, trek among trees, swim with salmon, or boat near bears. Unfortunately, every effort to protect public lands on Vancouver Island has run into a brick wall – the 1994 CORE (Commission on Resources and Environment) Land Use Plan. That’s it for parks on the Island, the BC Liberals proclaim. 13% of the Island’s land area was protected under the plan, though this amounts to only 6% of its low elevation, productive forests where the big trees grow, since much of our park lands are alpine rock and ice. –Ken Wu http://www.canada.com/victoria/timescolonist/index.html

Washington:

4) Hey everyone! Photos of the action are available on the SeaRAG Action-Photo site:
http://community.webshots.com/user/justinrr We had an amazing day of action today! Somewhere between 10 and 20 folks petitioning customers throughout the day, and a killer convergence rally in Westlake Square. Complete with a bullhorn, Kleercut box costumes, caribou and tree costumes, and lots of fun! Good work everbody who showed up in the rain and helped put together a kick-ass day of action! Also look at the cute, megaphone-equipped caribou that made it to the front of the RAN webpage! Do you recognize her? http://ran.org/ 350 actions in the US and Canada, and we land on the cover!-Onward and upward, Justin justin.rr@gmail.com

5) Gov. Christine Gregoire called Wednesday for broader state powers to limit development in national forests, joining three other Western states in a challenge of the Bush administration’s forest protections. In a petition to Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns, Gregoire asked that states be allowed to adopt President Clinton’s so-called roadless rule, which banned development on 58 million acres of national forests. That 2001 policy protected more than 2 million acres of national forest in Washington, but Bush administration revisions could allow new roads and commercial logging on about 716,000 acres, Gregoire said. “Washingtonians overwhelmingly want these lands protected, and I intend to do everything within the state’s power to see that they are,” she said in a statement. In August, Oregon, California and New Mexico filed a federal lawsuit against the Forest Service repeal of the roadless rule. Environmental groups have filed a similar lawsuit and are circulating a petition calling for reinstatement of the 2001 policy. Gregoire is mulling over a possible Washington state lawsuit against the Bush roadless rules, but she also may decide to join the existing three-state suit, environmental policy adviser Elliot Marks said. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/246905_roadless03.html

Oregon:

6)The Bush administration has rejected Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski’s petition to amend its new roadless-forests rule to give states greater certainty that logging can be kept out of undeveloped areas to protect clean water and wildlife habitat. The petition filed last month asked the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture to give states the option of adopting the 2001 roadless policy created under the Clinton administration, which barred commercial logging in large undeveloped blocks of national forests. http://159.54.226.83/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051104/STATE/511040325/1042

7) Today Representative Greg Walden (R-OR-2) and Brian Baird (D-WA) introduced a bill that will sweep aside protections for forests, fish and wildlife in order to rush logging and roadbuilding after normal, natural events that occur in National Forest. The bill eliminates meaningful environmental review and cuts the public out of decisions that would harm America’s public forests. The Walden bill is an extreme example of what happens when money from the logging industry influences politicians that are entrusted with protecting America’s natural heritage. The bill is so unreasonable that almost any kind of natural event (from rain storms, droughts and windstorms to fires, floods and volcano eruptions) would trigger logging exemptions from current environmental protections. Walden said environmentalists were basically accusing loggers of setting fires, in the hope that a forest would burn and their company would win a salvage logging contract. “Arson is a crime — a felony,” Walden said. “We have arsonists in prison today.” http://www.azdailysun.com/non_sec/nav_includes/story.cfm?storyID=118458 http://www.azdailysun.com/non_sec/nav_includes/story.cfm?storyID=118548

8) KS Wild filed a lawsuit in late October against the BLM’s proposed old-growth logging in the Willy Slide timber sale. The Glendale Resource Area of the Medford BLM continues to log the remaining old-growth forests on the West Fork of Cow Creek as if there is no tomorrow. Following on the heels of the massive Mr. Wilson and Bear Pen old-growth timber sales which illegally logged hundreds of acres Northern Spotted Owl critical habitat, the BLM is now prepared to cut yet another 197 acres of native-forest in this fragile watershed. The BLM is proposing 52 acres of “regeneration” clearcutting, and 145 acres of thinning in these increasingly rare ancient forests. The BLM admits that the “regeneration” logging will create fiber plantations with an increased fire risk while removing yet another 27 acres of suitable Northern Spotted Owl habitat. We hope that the BLM will begin to focus on watershed restoration projects such as thinning existing plantations and catching up on the road maintenance backlog, rather than log remaining ancient forests. http://www.kswild.org

California:

9) San Francisco – People walking by Civic Center Plaza today were greeted by 30 toilets with (artificial) trees down them and a banner reading “Kimberly-Clark: Flushing Ancient Forests Down the Toilet” suspended above. A truck designed as a tissue box with the word “Kleercut” on it was stationed nearby, broadcasting on 95.3FM so that drivers could tune in to learn about Kleenex’s role in forest ruin. The protest was part of Greenpeace’s “Kleercut” campaign (http://www.kleercut.net), which is warning consumers that Kimberly-Clark, the maker of Kleenex, Cottonelle and Scott, makes these products from trees coming from North America’s largest ancient forest, the Boreal. Today’s protest was one of 350 that took place in the United States and Canada as part of a Day of Action to raise awareness of the threats to the Boreal. Several environmental groups, including the Rainforest Action Network and ForestEthics, and hundreds of activists held events against companies that exploit the Boreal to make disposable paper products such as catalogs, toilet paper, and copy paper. Greenpeace and the Natural Resources Defense Council are pressuring Kimberly-Clark to stop supporting clearcut logging in the Boreal, and to use recycled paper for its products. Other corporate targets include Victoria’s Secret, Xerox and Weyerhaeuser. http://sf.indymedia.org/news/2005/11/1721593.php

Montana:

10) A trio of lifelong conservationists filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Bitterroot National Forest supervisor Dave Bull on Monday, disputing their ejection from a U.S. Forest Service press conference this fall. The news conference, which unveiled a controversial fuels reduction project, was held at Bull’s office on Sept. 22. Jim Miller, president of the conservation group Friends of the Bitterroot, described his removal as anti-democratic, and said the incident reflects a growing insularity within the Bush administration. Miller was escorted from the office by a Forest Service law enforcement officer who was armed and wearing a bulletproof vest. “The Bush administration has made a practice of excluding individuals who disagree with its policy,” Miller said. “We hope to set a precedent whereby citizens will be guaranteed full participation, and we feel our only recourse is to go through the legal system.” In the lawsuit filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Missoula, Friends of the Bitterroot contend that their constitutional rights were violated when Bull barred them from the news conference – and ask that they be given access to all such events in the future. The three men say they were barred from the press conference merely because they didn’t support the Forest Service’s preferred alternative. Their primary objections to the project include soil damage – caused by heavy logging equipment – and the clearcutting of old-growth timber. “This has been going on for a couple of years now, and it’s required by law to be a public process,” Campbell said. “And here they come to the grand finale, when they’re unveiling their preferred alternative, and they all of a sudden step back and say it’s not a public process. It just doesn’t fly.” http://www.missoulian.com/articles/2005/11/01/news/top/news01.txt

11) Here’s how it works: Places without roads ( currently only in national parks , national forest and BLM roadless areas) have the best air quality, the best water quality, the highest number of rare species, the best hunting, the best fishing, the best wild outdoor recreation, the least light pollution, and the least noise pollution. These roadless portions of national forests act like “buffers” to the rest of the national forests and parks, acting as reservoirs of wildness to all lands that surround these wild roadless cores. They are without question the most important aspect of land conservation in the United States. Once roadbuilding and mining occur in these areas, water quality declines, invasive plant and animal species increase, poaching increases, and the haibtat is fragmented. Roads cause erosion and silting of pristine mountain streams. The logging that follows the roads does this as well, and hurts rare species. As an example , the rare lynx is perfectly suited to roadless national forest lands because it has huge paws that allow it to hunt in the deepest, wildest forests in the winter time. When roads enter an area, this allows for a compacted snow condition that allows coyotes and foxes to enter lynx habitat and compete with them for snowshoe hare, etc. These wild roadless cores are the “heart” of the national park and national forest system. Without them, everything would fade. Also consider that these national forest lands provide a tiny fraction of our annual timber supply while continuing to lose millions ever year. See http://www.taxpayer.net/ Here is a map of the last wilderness areas in the country http://www.wilderness.net/ These don’t show unprotected wilderness areas. In order to gauge that, think of very small attachments to the already protected areas. http://www.newwest.net/index.php/main/article/4181/
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Arizona:

12) A Tucson-based environmental group has appealed a 12,400-acre fuels reduction project southwest of Williams. In its appeal, the Center for Biological Diversity objected only to the plan’s call to log trees larger than 16 inches in diameter in interior parts of the forest beyond buffer zones that would protect private homes and the city. Kaibab National Forest officials said the “City Project” is a high priority that would reduce the threat of catastrophic in areas south and west of Williams. Prevailing winds typically come from the southwest. If a fire were to start in this area, the flames would be pushed directly toward the community. “There has been substantial support for this project in the local community and an emphasis on moving forward quickly with treatments. At the very least, this appeal is going to delay the implementation of the project,” Williams District Ranger Steve Best said. The main objection to the plan is cutting trees farther than one-eighth of a mile into the forest. The environmentalists also oppose cutting “old growth forest” — what they define as ponderosa pines that are more than 14 inches in diameter in areas of high, dry land and more than 18 inches diameter in wetter areas.
http://www.azdailysun.com/non_sec/nav_includes/story.cfm?storyID=118458
South Dakota:

13) More logging and thinning of dense stands of ponderosa pines in Black Hills National Forest are called for in hundreds of pages of new management guidelines unveiled Monday. The so-called “Phase II Amendment” to the 15-year forest management plan for the Black Hills National Forest was signed Monday morning in Denver by Rick Cables, regional forester for the Rocky Mountain Region. The amendment is six years in the making. It is in response to a court-ordered settlement of appeals by environmental groups that challenged the original forest plan, first approved in 1997. “We were expecting a lot better from the Forest Service,” Jeremy Nichols of the Biodiversity Conservation Alliance said Monday. “If logging could make the forest healthier, the Black Hills would be the healthiest forest in the nation, and it’s not.” Nichols said the Forest Service wasn’t doing enough to protect old-growth timber stands, large-diameter trees and especially large, standing dead trees, or “snags,” which provide habitats for a variety of birds. Bobzien and Everett, however, each said that one of the few points almost everyone agreed on is that there should be more very large trees in the Black Hills. Bobzien said the amendment would do that. http://www.rapidcityjournal.com/articles/2005/11/01/news/local/news01.txt

Wyoming:

14) Wegweiser lives just more than a mile from the Forest Service access road to Carter Mountain, and called her field work in the area “very personally gratifying.” Her efforts over the summer are a case study of the kind of meticulous, carefully measured and sometimes unusual steps scientists must sometimes take to quantify something as complex as the impact of logging across an entire mountain. Her work involved rating the signs of logging activity on a four-point scale, from no impact (including in areas where no logging took place) to major impact, such as a fully developed logging road or severely disturbed soil. To ensure a random sampling of as much of the affected terrain as possible, she measured 1,000 data points in each of three timber sale areas, using randomly selected coordinates as starting locations. Wegweiser would then roll dice – the same kind of large fuzzy dice you might find hanging from the mirror of a classic car – to determine which direction she would travel to continue each measurement, using a 100-foot tape to mark out 100 data points along the way. The idea was that by measuring enough random points in random directions – 3,000 points in all – she could compile a representative sample of how soils across the area fared following timber harvesting. Wegweiser said she thought recreational activity and extensive small-scale firewood cutting displaced more wildlife than the major logging activity. As for soil erosion, she said, “most of the disturbance is low relative to the amount of harvested timber, which as a resource use is three percent of the entire 2.5 million acres” of the Shoshone National Forest. She said the Englemann spruce trees won’t grow back in the foreseeable future, with lodgepole pines more likely to populate the area over the next century. But she warns that recent warmer, drier years offer a longer production cycle for bark beetles, so their numbers are likely to multiply in the years ahead. http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php?id=1&display=rednews/2005/11/02/build/wyoming/25-carter-mt.inc

Illinois:
His table had to fight Burger King and the One Stop Rocky Shop in order to gain passersby attention. But with information packets to be read, bumper stickers to be taken, petitions to be signed and mind-opening videos to be watched, David Kirlin, computer science graduate student, got noticed. His booth at the University Union was in honor of the National Boreal Day of Action. Kirlin’s goals are quite similar to the goals of RAN, Greenpeace and ForestEthics, they are of the following: Globally phase out all logging of wood products from old growth forests. 1) Cease conversion of native forests to plantations. 2) Cease experimentation with genetically engineered trees. 3) Halt logging on U.S. public lands. 4) Pursue Forest Stewardship Council certification for forestry operations. 5) Maximize post-consumer recycled content across all product lines. http://www.westerncourier.com/media/paper650/news/2005/11/04/News/Student.Protests.Big.Business-1045895.s
html?norewrite

Nebraska:

16) Chadron State Park, in conjunction with several entities, is removing trees to save trees. “If we don’t manage resources, we have the potential for losing that resource,” said Chadron State Park forester Walt Nelson. “It’s something we haven’t done in a long time.” Workers at the park are cutting down diseased and unhealthy trees to eliminate conditions that would allow wildfires to compromise the forest, Nelson said. Several entities are involved in the project including the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission and the Nebraska Forest Service. The park will have a healthier forest with “wide open canopies, healthy trees and reduced fuels,” Nelson said. A commercial timber harvest of 140 acres, or one-third of the park, was completed in the spring of 2002 and a subsequent thinning and slash chipping project in the same area was completed a year later. The area included the eastern ends of the parks and the land around the cabins. The commercial logging in the current 190 acres of the park, including the back, west sides, was completed this spring. The thinning and slash piling of the same area is the current focus, with work slated to be finished next spring. Work on the remaining one-third of the part has yet to be scheduled. Managing a forest is continuous work, Nelson said, and thinning projects are needed at least every ten years to reduce the likelihood of wildfires. Nelson said that without management, dead and unhealthy timber builds up and increases the potential for a disastrous wildfire. http://www.southernblackhillsweeklygroup.com/articles/2005/11/02/chadron/headlines/news741.txt

Kentucky:

17) You may be surprised to learn that most Kentuckians favor protection of clean water, rare species and wild forests from industrial extraction on our public lands. Opinion polls by the Universities of Kentucky and Tennessee agree that at least three in four Kentucky residents want their national forest protected — not chopped up for coal, timber and development. With such overwhelming public interest in national forest protection, you would think that the Forest Service would spend most of its time protecting and restoring the Daniel Boone. Unfortunately, the truth is that the agency puts industrial extraction at the top of its list of priorities while our land, water and wildlife suffer the consequences. Encompassing a large portion of the headwaters of six of the state’s major rivers, this national forest provides drinking water to hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians. Some of the cleanest streams in the state attract anglers to the Boone, and nearly one in five of all native freshwater fish species in the U.S. have found a home there. One hundred and fifity years of logging, mining and development have left persistent scars on the land. Acid mine drainage from old, abandoned coal mines impairs over 40 miles of waterways in the forest. Old logging roads lie abandoned, washing away into streams and inviting invasive species, arsonists and vandals deep into the forest. Illegal off-roading enthusiasts have been trashing streams, stripping soil off hillsides, and killing and harassing wildlife for years while Forest Service law enforcement focuses on other priorities. Forest Service’s plans for the Boone focus instead on making more of a mess of this irreplaceable gem. In all, more than 200 miles of new road construction, 15 square miles of logging, 2 square miles of coal mining, hundreds of acres of development, and thousands of acres of ill-conceived burning and herbicide spraying are all on the table for the Boone. A forest management scheme worthy of public support will require a re-ordering of priorities for the Forest Service, but the benefits to society will be tremendous. http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051102/OPINION04/511020382

Florida:

18) Lying on its side like a wounded elephant, the mammoth baobab tree at The Kampong of the National Tropical Botanic Garden is waiting for rescue, covered with its own branches and leaves to protect it from the sun after being leveled by Hurricane Wilma. Held sacred in Africa and Madagascar, the baobab — stubby branches on top of a massive trunk so it’s sometimes said God planted it upside down — was sown in 1907 from a Tanzanian seed at the Department of Agriculture’s introduction station on Old Cutler Road. In 1965, the tree went over in Hurricane Cleo. When the USDA decided to get rid of it, the late Catherine Sweeney, who by then owned The Kampong in Coconut Grove, hired a 70-foot flatbed truck and transplanted it to her grounds, said director Larry Schokman. The ashes of people and pets have been scattered beneath it, Schokman said, “so we can’t leave it down.” The baobab joins 46 other Kampong trees that Schokman had propped up after Katrina, including the 100-foot kapok and a Bo tree (Ficus religiosa) that came from the Schwedegon Temple in Rangoon, Burma. Five other trees knocked over in Wilma have been propped up as well. Many of South Florida’s historic trees and palms were tossed and dismembered by a hurricane thought to be only moderately powerful by the time it came ashore. http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/13033266.htm

USA:

19) The Forest Service released the final off-road vehicle regulations today. The new regulations direct forests to end widespread cross-country travel by ATVs, dirt bikes, and other off-road vehicles. They direct forests to designate specific routes (and even limited areas open to cross-country travel) where off-road vehicles may be driven legally. The national rule does not have an immediate impact. Instead, it sets a process in motion. The new regulations will have no effect on the ground until designations of roads, trails, and areas are completed at the field level. Click here for full text of the final regulations: http://www.fs.fed.us/recreation/programs/ohv/. Preliminary analysis from The Natural Trails & Waters Coalition (NTWC) found that the new regulations fail to prevent the continued creation and use of unauthorized, renegade routes; and weaken the agency’s obligation to minimize damage and conflicts with other forest users that is required by President Nixon’s off-road vehicle Executive Order 11644. To read the National Trails and Waters Coalition press release go to: http://www.naturaltrails.org/pressroom/releases/2005/fs-ORV-Rules.htm.

Canada:

20) TORONTO – Sexy lingerie catalogues and extra-soft tissues aren’t worth destroying Canada’s ancient forests, environmental advocates said Thursday as they staged rallies in cities across North America on behalf of the continent’s boreal forest. Events were organized in Edmonton, Halifax, Toronto, Vancouver, New York, Las Vegas, Chicago and more than 100 other cities to protest what critics call the destruction of the boreal, which they say is also displacing wildlife like caribou. In Toronto, protesters wore horns to represent the endangered caribou and in Vancouver, organizers planned a mock clearcut in a public square. Corporations like Victoria’s Secret and Kimberly-Clark – which makes Kleenex-brand tissues and toilet paper – are making their products and catalogues with trees from endangered forests, protesters said. “These guys are irresponsibly consuming paper and forest products and that’s just not acceptable, to destroy the boreal for throw-away things like catalogues, junk mail and tissue products,” said Lafcadio Cortesi of the San Francisco-based group ForestEthics. North America’s boreal forest stretches from Alaska to the Atlantic Ocean, sweeping every province except Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. It is among the three most expansive forests in the world, accounting for 25 per cent of the planet’s remaining intact, roadless forests. ForestEthics said Victoria’s Secret mails out more than one million catalogues every day – about 395 million a year – and the paper is largely coming from the boreal. “What a waste of our heritage,” said prominent lawyer Clayton Ruby, who’s also an environmental activist. “The sale of underwear – that’s not a good enough reason for destroying boreal forests.” http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Science/2005/11/03/1291509-cp.html

21) Environmentalists demonstrated in over 160 Canadian and American cities today against Kimberly-Clark as part of an International Day of Action to Save the Boreal Forest. Kimberly-Clark, the world’s largest tissue product manufacturer, is destroying North America’s ancient forests to make throw away products like toilet paper and tissues. In Toronto and San Francisco, Greenpeace activists set up art installations of trees being flushed down toilets, with banners reading: “Kimberly-Clark: Flushing Ancient Forests Down the Toilet”. In Vancouver, they set up a mock area of clearcut forest in a public square and in Knoxville, Tennessee, a group of activists sealed off Kimberly-Clark’s world administrative headquarters with yellow “Forest Crime Scene” tape and projected giant photos of areas of clearcut forest onto the building.
Kimberly-Clark does not use any recycled materials in its ‘at-home’ brands such as Kleenex. Instead, the company uses over 3 million tonnes of virgin tree pulp from North America’s ancient Boreal forests each year, equivalent to the weight of over 17,000 jumbo jets. Over 124, 000 people have sent emails from Greenpeace’s www.kleercut.net to Kimberly-Clark. http://www.greenpeace.ca/e/gallery/view_album.php?set_albumName=album20

22) Take Action now to help protect the Canadian Boreal forests by send a fax to the CEO, of Victoria’s Secret. Today is the International Day of Action to protect the Canadian Boreal. There will be over 350 protests and events demanding that companies such as Kimberly-Clark, Victoria’s Secret, and Xerox stop using paper that comes from Endangered Forests in the Boreal in their tissue products, catalogs and copy paper. Protests and events are being held in cities as diverse as Birmingham, Ala.; Edmonton, Alberta; Halifax, Nova Scotia; Las Vegas, Nev.; Seattle; Toronto; Tulsa, Okla.; and Wichita, Kans. In suburban Atlanta, activists will protest outside of Kimberly-Clark’s operations headquarters, where the company’s vice president of environment and energy works. In New York City, Reverend Billy and his Church of Stop Shopping will preach outside the Victoria’s Secret in Herald Square and perform a skit involving “saving” a fallen Victoria’s Secret angel. Join the day of action to save the Boreal. TAKE ACTION NOW FROM YOUR DESKTOP. You’re message will be sent directly to the CEO of Limited Brands, Lesley Wexner. Let’s let him hear loud and clear that we don’t want the Canadian Boreal to end up as Victoria’s Secret catalogs. The Day of Action to Save North America’s Great Canadian Boreal, has been spearheaded by ForestEthics, National Resources Defense Council, Greenpeace, Rainforest Action Network, Boreal Songbird Initiative, and hundreds of local groups in the US and Canada. www.victoriasdirtysecret.net or www.forestethics.org

23) EDMONTON — Canada must learn quickly how to adapt to climate change in the boreal forest, warns a report released today by a national advisory agency. It could be too hot and dry for trees at the southern limit of the forest, says the report by the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy, an independent body created by the federal government. The increased intensity of fires and insect outbreaks will further ravage the forests. This will affect the forestry industry and the communities that are based in the forest, the report says. It would also have a global impact. The boreal forests — the northernmost forest zone in the northern hemisphere — are the largest storehouse of carbon in the world. They store nearly twice as much carbon as tropical rain forests. Most of this carbon is in the ground, including vast stretches of peatlands. If this carbon is disturbed, by fire or plow, it combines with oxygen to form carbon dioxide, a gas responsible for climate change. If boreal forest destruction increases enough, the forests will turn into a carbon dioxide source instead of a storehouse. “So what happens to the boreal has a big impact on what happens to the climate,” said Cathy Wilkinson, director of the Canadian Boreal Initiative. The boreal group, formed in 2003, works with a wide range of conservation organizations, First Nations, industry and other interested parties to link science, policy and conservation activities in Canada’s boreal forest. “If all that carbon is released it can actually contribute to climate change.” http://www.ran.org/news/newsitem.php?id=1652&area=news

Finland:

24) The Finnish Association for Nature Conservation (FANC) is accusing the Finnish State forestry enterprise Metsähallitus of planning the logging of protected old-growth forests. The FANC and Metsähallitus negotiated on the fate of the old-growth forests of northern Finland for two years. The talks ended in June this year after Metsähallitus told it would protect 100,000 hectars it owned in northern Finland. Some 55,000 of this is forest. The FANC says the majority of the forest now to be logged has already been protected once, by Metsähallitus itself. The FANC says that in reality, only 20,000 of the 55,000 hectars are new, formerly unprotected forests, and that old-growth forests in natural state with endangered flora and fauna living in them are now under the threat of being erased. http://newsroom.finland.fi/stt/showarticle.asp?intNWSAID=10595&group=General

25) A logging dispute which has been brewing for years in the north of Finnish Lapland between Metsähallitus, a state enterprise that supplies wood to the Finnish forest industry, and local reindeer herders took a new turn on during the weekend, when activists of Greenpeace took a truckload of logging waste to Germany. Greenpeace, which has taken the side of the reindeer herders in the dispute, brought the discarded branches and other waste from Paadarskaid in Inari to Germany as evidence of their claims. Metsähallitus alleges that the wood has been gathered without permission, and that the reindeer-herders and their families would get a written notice and an invoice for the wood that was taken away. Greenpeace activist Jarmo Pyykkö said that when the branches are left behind after felling, they cover the moss that the reindeer eat. “We did not inform Metsähallitus about our action ahead of time, because we were afraid that we would have been prevented from carrying it out”, Pyykkö says. The lorry commissioned by Greenpeace came to Inari from Germany, and Pyykkö says that it has gone back. The police inspected the vehicle in Ivalo, and allowed it to go ahead. Pertti Heikuri, the Metsähallitus head of forestry in the area, says that the same action will be taken as in all cases in which an outsider trespasses on a work site to collect wood without permission. http://www.helsinginsanomat.fi/english/article/Greenpeace+sends+truckload+of+logging+waste+from+Finnish+La
pland+to+Germany/1101981481755

Zimbabwe:

26) Government has warned people who continue to cut protected trees without a licence, to stop, or face prosecution. The Department of Water Affairs and Forestry (DWAF) issued the warning after the department successfully obtained judgment against two farmers who cleared protected trees without the necessary licenses. Departmental spokesperson Babs Naidoo said certain trees were protected by law and anyone wishing to cut or utilise these trees, ought to apply for a licence from their local DWAF office.In terms of the National Forests Act, no person may cut, disturb, damage or destroy any protected tree or possess, collect, remove, transport, export, purchase, sell or donate any protected tree or any forest product derived from such a tree without a license. “Since the Department has stepped up enforcing the National Forest Act, various cases have come before the courts. “The cases in question involve the clearing of Camel thorn trees (Acacia erioloba), to make way for agricultural fields,” he said. These cases started in 2003 and in both instances the farmers were found guilty and fined R10 000 and R5 000, respectively, in September this year. http://allafrica.com/stories/200511020708.html

Uganda:

27) A fog envelopes the steep and remote valleys of southwestern Uganda most mornings, as birds found only in this small corner of the continent rise in chorus and the great apes drink from clear streams. Days in the dense montane forest are quiet and steamy. Nights are an exaltation of insects and primate howling. For thousands of years the Batwa people thrived in this soundscape, in such close harmony with the forest that early-twentieth-century wildlife biologists who studied the flora and fauna of the region barely noticed their existence. In the 1930s, Ugandan leaders were persuaded by international conservationists that this area was threatened by loggers, miners, and other extractive interests. In response, three forest reserves were created—the Mgahinga, the Echuya, and the Bwindi—all of which overlapped with the Batwa’s ancestral territory. And the Batwa stayed on, living as they had for generations, in reciprocity with the diverse biota that first drew conservationists to the region. Nonetheless, under pressure from traditional Western conservationists, who had come to believe that wilderness and human community were incompatible, the Batwa were forcibly expelled from their homeland. Now they are living in shabby squatter camps on the perimeter of the parks, without running water or sanitation. In one more generation their forest-based culture—songs, rituals, traditions, and stories—will be gone. Today the list of culture-wrecking institutions put forth by tribal leaders on almost every continent includes not only Shell, Texaco, Freeport, and Bechtel, but also more surprising names like Conservation International, Nature Conservancy, World Wildlife Fund, and the Wildlife Conservation Society. Even the more culturally sensitive World Conservation Union might get a mention. “We are enemies of conservation,” declared Maasai leader Martin Saning’o, standing before a session of the November 2004 World Conservation Congress. Saning’o reminded his audience, “…we were the original conservationists.” http://www.oriononline.org/pages/om/05-6om/Dowie.html

Honduras:

28) The Center for International Policy and The Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) jointly released a report titled “The Illegal Logging Crisis in Honduras.” The result of a year-long undercover investigation by EIA, the report documents how U.S. imports of illegal Honduran wood increase poverty, fuel corruption and devastate forests and communities. The report names the U.S. firms, including Home Depot, that profit from the trade, and offers recommendations to the Honduran and US government on how to end this crisis. According to Allan Thornton, EIA’s investigation and report “document an epic tragedy for Honduras. We discovered a far-reaching web of corruption and illegalities involving politicians, bureaucrats, timber companies, mayors, police and other officials. The US is the biggest importer of Honduran timber; EIA is calling on the US government to urgently enact the commitment they made at the G8 summit to stop the import of illegal wood.” Illegal logging is destabilizing democracy and weakening civil society in Honduras. Robert White stated: “The U.S. demand for this illegally harvested Honduran timber is helping to propel a rogue industry that destroys ecosystems, rots democratic institutions and harms the people, especially the poorest Hondurans, whose lives depend on healthy forests.” Honduran officials have broken promises to help end the illegal trade. http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=56127

China:

29) Under the looming presence of the Central Mountain Range, surrounded by a moat-like torrent of a stream, lies Logging Compartment 98. Better known as Chinan Forest Recreation Area. Established in 1981, the 144 hectare park is divided into two areas — namely the Chinan FRA and the Liyu Mountain hiking area. Although rather small, Chinan still offers some unique experiences. Apart from the two modest museums, the park is strewn with forestry relics including a cable car, steam and diesel logging engines and four trains. Hikers tastes are also accounted for as the park is covered in a web of trails, reaching an altitude of 601 meters. Close to the peak is a memorial dedicated to the large number of loggers who died in the deforestation process. One must walk with caution however, as the area is known to be inhabited by the venomous green bamboo viper and is covered in patches of pain-inducing stinging nettles. The young at heart can also find stimulation here as they rush down the mountainside on grass skis. If all this is just too overwhelming then a therapeutic walk along the acupressure stream, listening to the gurgle of running water, is just what the doctor ordered. http://www.chinapost.com.tw/travel/detail.asp?ID=71328&GRP=g

Borneo:

30) Twenty-nine forest workers completed a three-day training development programme hosted by the Sarawak Timber Association (STA)’s subsidiary, STA Training Sdn Bhd here recently. They each received a Certificate in Chainsaw Maintenance, Tree Felling and Log Extraction. Scores of them also completed the Train-the-Trainers course.The course facilitator was Shane Lett from the Forest Industries Training and Education Council in New Zealand. Speaking at the certificate presentation ceremony held at Regency Plaza Hotel last Saturday afternoon, chairman of STA Datuk Leo Chai explained that the training programme aimed to provide skilled forest workers to the logging industry in Sarawak. http://www.brunei-online.com/bb/wed/nov2b6.htm

Phillipines:

31) BISHOP Leonardo Y. Medroso and other members of the clergy of Borongan town in Eastern Samar province took to the pulpit their stand against the government’s decision lifting the moratorium on logging in a protected area on Samar island. The “collective howl of protest” was read during homilies on All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day, in the clergy’s effort to make the flock aware of their stand after the Department of Environment and Natural Resources allowed San Jose Timber Corp. (SJTC), a logging firm reportedly owned by Senator Juan Ponce Enrile, to resume operations. The clergy’s statement pointed out that no consultation or public hearing was held prior to the lifting of the moratorium, which, it said, would affect not only the forest area conceded to the Enrile firm but also the lives of hundreds of thousands of Samareños. It said the 95,770 hectares of timber concession to the firm lie at the heart of the 120,000 hectares of old-growth forest and critical watershed constituting the Samar Integrated Forest Reserve (SIFR) and the Samar Island Nature Park (SINP), an offshoot of a $12-million conservation project being funded by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). “Now the resumption of commercial logging in these protected areas is to make a mockery of the purposes and goals of the SIFR and SINP,” it added. “Once more, we are facing a serious challenge as residents of Samar Island and as a people of faith. We stand to systematically lose again our now flourishing forest cover because the logging moratorium that has saved it since 1989 has been lifted,” said the statement signed by Medroso and 45 priests belonging to 25 parishes of the diocese. The order allowing the Enrile firm to resume operations lifted the logging moratorium on Samar, which was imposed by then President Corazon Aquino on Feb. 8, 1989, after floods and landslides killed nearly 100 persons and destroyed P100 million worth of crops. http://news.inq7.net/nation/index.php?index=1&story_id=55364

Indonesia:

32) Buoyed by demand driven mainly by China and India, the Indonesian government is trying to revive investor interest in its pulp and paper industry, four years after it was rocked by the biggest emerging market debt default in history. Indonesia wants to lure investors to build three pulp mills on the island of Borneo at a cost of at least $3 billion, according to government officials. The building of new mills would fulfill a longstanding government ambition of significantly expanding the Indonesian pulp and paper industry. But forest researchers and environmental activists say the industry is already running above its capacity because of a shortage of plantation timber. The plan faces stiff opposition, however, from environmental and forestry research organizations concerned about extensive logging of Indonesia’s natural forests. The sector was stalled by the 1997 economic crisis and a $13.9 billion debt default in 2001 by Asia Pulp & Paper, one of the biggest companies in the global industry. When the economic crisis hit, the government had plans for seven new mills on Borneo alone, according to the Center for International Forestry Research, based in Bogor, Indonesia. http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/11/02/business/pulp.t.php

33) BETUNG KERIHUN NATIONAL PARK — A river the color of pale toffee coursed through a valley, carrying several types of rare fish. A young orangutan, a member of a threatened species, dangled merrily by one leg from a tree. In the heart of Borneo, home to one of the world’s last remaining expanses of intact rain forest, Hermas Rintik Maring, an avid conservationist who is native to the area, marveled at the life within the vast canopies of jungle green that for centuries have made this tropical island vital to the health of the region. At the same time, he said, he fears this pristine forest could fall to the whine of chainsaws and the rumble of bulldozers clearing land for what has been billed as the world’s largest palm oil plantation. The project, brokered by the Indonesian government in Jakarta, could affect as many as 5 million acres of Borneo’s forest — an area slightly smaller than the state of Vermont — near Indonesia’s 1,250-mile-long border with Malaysia. Officials hope China will finance the project on the island, which is divided between Indonesia and Malaysia. Indonesian officials claim the plantation could bring the area a half a million jobs directly related to the industry and 500,000 more in spin-off jobs in schools, health care and other services. It could produce more than 10 million tons of crude palm oil a year, they said, worth about $4.6 billion. But environmentalists such as Hermas, 28, a field officer for the Worldwide Fund for Nature in Indonesia, worry that without careful planning the project could destroy Borneo’s profusion of plants, insects and animals. “It would be one of man’s great mistakes,” said Hermas, his eyes sweeping across a panorama of olive-colored forests and blue-gray mountains from a clearing 1,800 feet high. “It would be unforgivable.”The plan is still in its infancy. It envisions a series of large plantations owned by private companies and linked by roads and palm oil mills. Exactly where everything would go has not been decided. That lack of clarity has prompted growing controversy. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/01/AR2005110101552.html

Australia:

34) There are concerns the logging of a forest block near Collie has been the subject of sabotage following the discovery of hundreds of trees marked for conservation without authorization. The Forest Products Commission is harvesting the Palmer One Block as part of its schedule to supply local sawmills. But the commission’s Kevin Haylock says thousands of dollars in taxpayers’ money has been wasted through the unauthorized marking of trees for retention. Mr Haylock says while he is unsure who is responsible for the action, he is concerned it is an attempt to stop the logging. “Most of the activity so far has been from a small group who’ve asked us to cease harvesting in Palmer and despite a degree of consultation that we’ve been through not everyone has changed their minds about that,” Mr Haylock said. “So it may well be some of those people who are using the passive form of protest.” But Ken Waterhouse from the Collie Conservation Group says conservationists are not responsible for marking the trees. “If someone else has been coming in off the road and hasn’t been part of the protest camp here and they’re going and marking the trees then that could be happening but it’s certainly none of us conservationists here.” http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200511/s1496955.htm