Logging

Scientists agree that habitat alteration is the leading cause of mountain caribou declines. However the BC government has done little to reverse the habitat loss, and continues to authorize logging across nearly 60,000 hectares of mountain caribou habitat. Conservation groups have repeatedly asked for a moratorium on logging in caribou habitat until a provincial recovery plan is completed and implemented. But the government has responded only by asking the timber industry for voluntary logging deferrals, with very mixed results.

Ironically, the taxpayer-owned BC Timber Sales program (BCTS) is one of the top three loggers of remaining mountain caribou habitat. The largest logger of mountain caribou habitat is West Fraser Timber.

Who is Logging Mountain Caribou Habitat?*

*From Staring At Extinction published in May 2005. More recent analysis (December 2005) showed West Fraser to have 33,553 ha of planned cut-blocks in mountain caribou range. Tembec Inc. is theoretically 5th in area with 2,775 ha of cut-blocks approved, but the company has agreed to moratoria on all cut-blocks within mountain caribou habitat except where mountain pine beetle infestation is extensive, and to not build roads anywhere in mountain caribou habitat.