Agreement Reached in Canadian Environmental Battle
***********************************************9
6/17/99
*******************************
RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:
Title: Agreement reached in Canadian environmental battle
Source: REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: June 17, 1999
Byline: Reuters Limited.
VANCOUVER - An agreement is expected to be signed yesterday on logging in one of
Canada's most famous environmental battlegrounds that could even lead to
environmentalist promoting wood products from the area.
The pact between MacMillan Bloedel Ltd, natives and four environmental groups
will support the use of selective logging in
Clayoquot Sound, where nearly 800 people were arrested in a series of logging
roads blockades in 1993. "It's born out of years of conflict and years of the
different sides trying to understand each other," said Tzeporah Bergman, a
spokesperson for Greenpeace.
Under the agreement, Iisaak Forest Resources, a logging company owned 49 by the
Nuu-Chah-Nuluth Indians, will not Clayoquot Sound's remaining old-growth
watersheds.
The company will log the remaining areas in ways that respect "an extensive
suite of values - cultural, spiritual, recreational
and scenic," said manager Eric Schroff.
Clayoquot Sound is located in the lush coastal rainforests of Vancouver Island.
Loggers and environmentalist squared off in
a series of protests in the area in 1993 that occasionally turned violent.
Greenpeace, which has pushed an international boycott against wood from British
Columbia's old growth rainforests, will help publicise the agreement even help
find markets for Clayoquot Sound products.
"This sets a precedent for the rest of British Columbia, Bergman told Reuters.
The agreement will also be signed by the Natural Resources Defence Council, the
Sierra Club of British Columbia and the Western Canada Wilderness Committee.