Report Documents Corporate Temperate "Rainforest Ravagers" in Canada
8/14/96
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/** gp.press: 125.0 **/
** Topic: 8/13 BC,Canada:"Rainforest Ravagers **
** Written 4:38 PM Aug 14, 1996 by nobody@xs2.greenpeace.org in cdp:gp.press *
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Subject: 8/13 BC,Canada:"Rainforest Ravagers" Report Release
Date: Wed, 14 AUG 96 17:38:23 GMT
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Original-TO: World Press (Green2:Green2:Gnl:INET)
Original-TO: The.Greenbase@green2.greenpeace.org
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GREENPEACE RELEASES "RAINFOREST RAVAGERS" DOCUMENTING
CORPORATE DESTRUCTION OF THE RAINFOREST
Press Release-Vancouver, B.C., August 13, 1996 (GP) Greenpeace today released a
report documenting the control and destruction of Canada's temperate rainforests
by 10 large timber companies. At a press conference today in Vancouver,
Greenpeace announced that it is launching an international campaign to protect
the temperate rainforests, expanding their work from Clayoquot Sound to the
coast of British Columbia.
"One half of the world's temperate rainforest have already been destroyed and
unless we take action now within the next 10 years most of Canada's rainforest
will be clearcut or suffer serious ecological damage through fragmentation and
roadbuilding," said Greenpeace forests campaigner Karen Mahon.
The Greenpeace report documents the control of Canada's temperate rainforests by
timber corporations and summarises that three companies (MacMillan Bloedel,
Interfor and Doman/Western Forest Products) control 50 per cent of the
logging of Canada's temperate rainforests. The top 10 companies control 75 per
cent of rainforest logging.
According to the companies' development plans, logging or roading is scheduled
to occur in over half of the approximate 50 rainforest valleys that are
currently unlogged within the next five years.
"In the Amazon, a place of global concern, only 15 per cent of the rainforest
has been lost. In Canada we have already lost 50 per cent of our old growth
rainforest and the rest is disappearing at an incredible rate," said Tamara
Stark of Greenpeace Canada. "Temperate rainforests are an endangered ecosystem
and we must take decisive action now if we are preserve them for the future."
Greenpeace is calling for an immediate moratorium on logging in the remaining
pristine rainforest areas, and an immediate end to clearcutting and roadbuilding
in the temperate rainforest. In the longer term Greenpeace is seeking a phase-
out of industrial logging in the remaining old growth rainforests, with a shift
to logging secondary forests according to ecological principles.
Greenpeace is launching an international campaign to protect the temperate
rainforest. The campaign will consist of community work, lobbying, tracking and
publicizing rainforest products in the marketplace and public protests.
For the past week Greenpeace has been engaged in blockades against the Haida
Brave, MacMillan Bloedel's log barge. MacMillan Bloedel is currently pursuing a
lawsuit and civil injunction to prevent further Greenpeace protests.
For more information contact:
Karen Mahon, Tamara Stark or Steve Shallhorn at the Greenpeace
office, 253-7701 or on board the Moby Dick at 220-7701 or
329-2991
BACKGROUNDER
The Rainforest Ravagers: Canadian Temperate Rainforest Under
Siege The Facts
* 50% of the worlds' temperate rainforests have already been destroyed
* British Columbia is home to 25% of the world's remaining temperate rainforests
* new satellite mapping is revealing that 50% of British Columbia's temperate
rainforest has already been destroyed
* within the next 10 years most of the remaining old growth temperate rainforest
in British Columbia will be clearcut logged or fragmented by roading
* 3 companies in British Columbia (MacMillan Bloedel, Interfor, Doman/Western
Forest Products) control 50% of the wood cut in Canada's temperate rainforests
* 10 companies control 77 percent of the rainforest cut
* in many regions up to 90% of the revenue generated by the logging leaves the
local community