To the Editor,
Re: Don’t listen to crisis letters, Letters, April 14
Mr. Hornridge’s letter in favour of old growth logging is very disturbing; long on rhetoric and innuendo and short on facts. In 2008 SFU researchers produced a study titled “Dollars and Sense” for the Fraser Forest Region and more recently a 2020 study commissioned by the Ancient Forest Alliance for their submission to the Government Forestry Review was mentioned by Nanaimo councillor Ben Geselbracht in a public Zoom meeting. Both studies used science and economics based modelling and concluded there is more benefit in preserving the remaining old growth financially, employing more people in the long term in more areas, preserving bio-diversity, helping sustain fish and wildlife and supporting carbon sequestration/climate change mitigation.
Mr. Hornridge resorts to fear mongering when he states “Politicians pander to stakeholder groups who seek to stop the forest industry.” He attempts to divide and conquer by implying that the middle and lower classes are at the mercy of elitist “green groups” and are facing “job loss and economic collapse”.
This is hogwash.
No one wants to stop the forest industry, it just needs to become a more sustainable activity. There is no justification for continued old growth logging and the opposition to it goes across all age groups, classes and First Nations going back to the “War in the Woods”.
Mr. Hornridge’s advised path falsely assumes we can continue to log with a “me first” attitude, highgrading the forest without acknowledging the cost to the planet’s bio-diversity and the rightful heritage of our future generations.
David S. Morton,
Port Alberni