Canada’s degraded forests need your help

Photo credit: TJ Watt

Hold Canada’s natural resources minister accountable!

Assessing the overall wellbeing and ecological health of a forest is measured by evaluating its structure, function, and composition.

Status quo logging practices disturb forest health. When a forest is logged, forest structure and composition are degraded by the removal of old growth, standing dead trees and fallen logs. Logging roads are incisions that fragment previously intact forest patches.

These impacts lead to a significant decline in crucial forest functions, such as providing habitat for species like boreal woodland caribou, and storing carbon to reduce climate change.

Canada and industry report on the amount of wood logged annually but fail to track the cumulative impacts of logging year after year, such as the loss of primary and old-growth forests.

Canada also fails to report on whether or not logging is adequately upholding Indigenous rights, such as the right to free, prior and informed consent.

Let’s make sure Energy and Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson knows we’re paying attention.