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Environment Forest Ecosystems Forest Industries Forest Management Forest Products Greenhouse Gases NAFI Submissions Policy and Politics Renewable Energy Sustainability |
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Why the Greens Should Rethink Their Policy on ForestsAt the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, and recently at the Earth Summit+5 in New York, climate change, biodiversity, and forests have emerged as the top three items in the global environmental agenda.Governments, with the support of the environmental community, have been able to hammer out agreements on the first two. The Climate Change Convention calls for a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, particularly of carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels. The Biodiversity Convention calls for the protection and sustainable use of biodiversity. For purely environmental reasons, I agree strongly with the aims of both these conventions. There was no agreement on forests, however, because there is too wide a gap among countries on what such an agreement should contain. Some countries are concerned mainly with forest management issues and sustainable forestry while others are more concerned with conservation, protection, and the prevention of deforestation. The environmental movement initially voiced strong support for a convention, so long as it was mainly concerned with preservation of forests. In the wake of the Earth Summit in 1992 the Intergovernmental Panel on Forests was formed under the UN Commission for Sustainable Development in order to pursue the idea of an international agreement on forests. The Panel held four meetings in Geneva and New York between September, 1995 and February, 1997. Going into the fourth meeting it had become obvious that any international convention must address the subject of forest management as well as preservation. As proof of their real agenda, nearly all the environmental groups reversed their position and came out against an agreement. Greenpeace referred to it as the "Chainsaw Convention", as if to say it would be fine to have an agreement as long as it banned cutting trees. Partly as a result of this sudden about-face, the international community remains in complete confusion regarding global policy on forests and forestry. I believe this is because the environmental movement's position is misleading, illogical, and most important, inconsistent with their more reasonable policies on climate change and biodiversity. In fact, their forestry policy is diametrically opposed to their policies in these other areas and is therefore an anti-environmental policy. The environmental movement's opposition to forestry is squarely based on their contentions that it is the main cause of forest loss (deforestation) and of biodiversity loss (species extinction). They are wrong on the facts on both these charges. The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the UN, which is responsible for both agriculture and forests, defines deforestation as "The permanent removal of forest cover and conversion of the land to another use such as agriculture or human settlement". They estimate that 95% of deforestation is caused by clearing for farms and towns, not forestry. This makes sense as the whole purpose of forestry is to grow trees, i.e. to keep the land forested. Forestry causes reforestation, the opposite of deforestation. Both the World Wildlife Fund and Greenpeace have stated that logging is the main cause of species extinction. Yet they are unable to provide the Latin name of a single species that has gone extinct due to forestry.. The truth is, species extinctions are generally caused by deforestation, hunting, and introduced species of predators and disease, not by forestry. Why do these groups accuse forestry of causing extinction? I don't know their precise motivation, but consider the question from another angle. If logging is not responsible for species extinction, what other good reason is there for opposing it, provided it is done sustainably? Based on these two false allegations, the movement has adopted a policy that would see a major reduction in the use of forests as a supply of wood. They argue, unfortunately with apparent logic, that by drastically reducing the harvest of trees, the forest will be saved along with all the creatures that live there. How could we reduce wood consumption? First, it is important to note that fully 50% of all wood used in the world is burned to supply energy for cooking and heating, mostly in developing countries where the people cannot afford fossil fuels. And that is probably good because if they could it would only add to greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. The environmental movement is surprisingly quiet on this major use of forests even though unsustainable fuel wood gathering is a major cause of deforestation in the tropical countries. The environmentalist agenda for wood-use reduction is two-pronged. First, they want us to stop making paper from trees and to use "non-wood fibers" to make "tree-free paper". Some of the candidate crops are hemp, kenaf, cotton and wheat straw. This may sound good at first but there is a serious problem. Where will we grow all these exotic, annual, monoculture farm crops, enough to provide 300 million tonnes of paper per year? Unfortunately, we would have to grow them where we could be growing trees. It simply makes no sense for groups who say their main concern is the protection of biodiversity to advocate massive monocultures where there could be forests. It's not as if there is a huge surplus of extra land in the world. Therefore, the environmental movement's position on paper production is diametrically opposed to their position on biodiversity. Birds and squirrels prefer trees to hemp farms. The plain fact is, if you don't use wood to make paper, there is less reason to grow trees. The second prong of their agenda is to reduce wood use as a building material and substitute it with so-called "environmentally appropriate alternatives." Just what are these alternatives? The only viable substitutes for wood as a building material are steel, cement, plastic, and bricks. All of these materials require a great deal more energy to make than wood. Why? Because wood is renewable and is made mainly with solar energy in a factory called the forest. All these substitutes are non-renewable and have severe negative environmental impacts of their own. But most significantly, because they require more energy, they inevitably result in more carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel use and are therefore contributors to climate change. Again, the so-called environmental position on wood use runs 180 degrees opposite the position that would support climate change policy. All resource use has environmental impacts but wood is the most renewable material we use and forestry is the most sustainable of all the primary industries that supply us with our materials. It is time the environmental movement recognized the basic contradictions in their policy on forest and forestry. There is a simple way to bring the environmental movement's policy on forests in line with their policies on biodiversity and climate change. The fundamental requirement is to take the focus off reducing wood use and to put it on increasing forest cover and productivity. This means growing more trees, putting the millions of hectares of unused and inefficiently used farmland back to forests, and reversing deforestation in the tropics. It means using our international assistance budgets to help developing countries grow their fuelwood sustainability and in the end it means using more renewable wood and less non- renewable steel, cement, plastic and fossil fuels. It makes no sense at all for environmentalists to be in favour of renewable energy such as solar and wind while at the same time being opposed to renewable materials that are produced by solar energy. This is the case whether the material is used for fuel, as in the case of ethanol made from sugar cane and wheat or for fiber, as in the case of cotton, flax and wood chips, or for building materials such as wood timbers. There is no doubt, that from the point of view of preserving biodiversity, trees are the best of all crops because forests provide more habitat than any other environment. There is also no doubt that when it comes to making a positive contribution to climate change, trees are the best, both because trees are the greatest absorbers of carbon dioxide and because using wood results in lower carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels. Many environmentalists seem to forget that there are 5.9 billion humans on this earth who wake up every morning with real needs for food, energy and materials to maintain our civilization. Over the past 10,000 years, we have helped satisfy those needs by gradually clearing away about 30% of the world's forests and replacing them with farm and pastures. This trend must now be party reversed if we want to protect biodiversity and prevent climate change. It cannot be reversed by the idealistic notion that if we stop using wood the forests will be saved. What thinking people will eventually come to realise is that the present policy of most of the environmental movement on forests is, in fact, an anti- environmental policy. The movement is entrenched in their position, partly because they are very shallow in forest science, and partly because it has proven so effective as a fund-raiser. A major effort is needed to give the public and our political leaders a more logical, internally consistent, science-based perspective on the issue of forest. I intend to be part of that effort and I know I've got my work cut out. Patrick Moore, Greenspirit 4068 West 32nd Avenue Vancouver, BC, Canada, V6S 1Z6 phone/fax 604 221 1990 email pmoore@rogers.wave.ca Web Site: Greenspirit Biographical Information Dr Patrick Moore has been a leading advocate for environmental protection for more than 25 years. He is a founding member of Greenpeace, was President of Greenpeace Canada for eight years and a Director of Greenpeace International for seven years. Recently, Dr Moore has directed efforts in British Columbia promoting sustainability, consensus building and collaborative efforts among competing concerns. In 1990 he founded Greenspirit, an environmental consultancy focusing on public involvement in the resource and energy sectors. As Chair of the Forest Practices Committee of the Forest Alliance of British Columbia, Dr Moore has been leading the process of developing the principles of sustainable forestry that have been adopted by a majority of the industry. |
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