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The Effects of Deforestation
Forests are crucial in maintaining the environmental conditions that make
life possible. Yet over 95 percent of the native forests of the United
States have been logged. The 5 percent that remains is almost entirely
on federal public lands.
The effects of logging go far beyond just the loss of trees. Healthy forests
are critical to ensuring clean water supplies, pure air, abundant fish
stocks and wildlife — the diversity of species on which all life
depends. Forests mitigate global warming by absorbing and storing carbon.
Intact forests regulate regional and global hydrologic cycles insuring
clean and adequate supplies of water. in addition, intact forests hold
soils in place, preserving fertility, and preventing floods, landslides
and the destructive siltation of fish spawning streams.
Communities have suffered from boom-and-bust cycles typical of logging,
but unlogged and restored forests will serve the sustainable and growing
tourism and outdoor recreation industries into the future.
Cities Demand Watershed Protection: During the winter of 1996,
siltation from excessive logging so badly damaged the watershed of Salem,
Oregon, that its water supply was rendered unusable for a month. Water
treatment facilities were unable to process the tons of mud and debris
washing down from clearcut slopes. Similarly, the city of Portland, Oregon,
population one million, has asked the Forest Service to stop logging its
water source the Bull Run watershed out of concern fur the region s rapid
growth, and the quality and quantity of the water available to support
it. Among other con siderations, the city does not wish to build an expensive
water filtration plant specifically to cleanse logging sediment.
Damaged Fisheries Threaten the Loss of Thousands of Jobs: Logging
threatens commercial and sports fishing by destroying fish habitat.Sedimentation
smothers spawning beds; erosion and landslides destroy trout streams;
and clearcuts raise the temperature of previously shaded streams killing
fish. The Columbia River system once boasted yearly migrations of 20 million
salmon. The numbers are now down to less than 2 million and 60,000 jobs
in the commercial fishing industry have been affected.
Recreation Far More Valuable than Logging: Recreation, hunting
and fishing in National Forests contribute vastly more income to the nation
s economy and generate far more jobs than logging on National Forests.
In fact, an April 1996 Forest Service report predicts that, by the year
2000, recreation, hunting and fishing on National Forests will contribute
31 .1-times more to the nation s economy and create 38. 1 times the number
of jobs than the existing timber sale program. (USFS, "The Forest
Service Program for Forest and Rangeland Resources: A Long-Term Strategic
Plan," Draft 1995, RPA Program, Oct. 1995, pp. IV-2 & IV -3.)
Logging Increases Fire Risk: The Sierra Nevada Ecosystem
Project summary states, "More than any other human activity, logging
has increased the risk and severity of fires 1\ removing the cooling shade
of trees and leaving flammable debris." (Status of the Sierra Nevada,
Vol 1., assessment of Summaries and Management Strategies,
p. 62, Sierra Nevada Ecosystem Project: Final Report to Congress, 1996.)
Forest health requires restoring fire to ecosystems in the form of controlled
burns, not logging the forests to save them.
The Federal Timber Sale Program Costs Taxpayers Billions
The Forest Service has, for the past 50 years, had control over much
of its timber sale receipts. The agency has learned that by giving the
timber industry what it wants cheap, subsidized federal timber it can
receive increased appropriations for its own budget. This results from
the influence of industry lobbyists or Congressional representatives from
forested states. The agency can grow its own budgets, staffs and operations
by selling more and more of the public's timber. And it has. Rather than
managing the forests for their long-term health and full panoply of benefits
— wilderness, watershed, recreations, etc. — "getting out
the cut" has become the measure of success within the agency.
Recent trade agreements have expanded industrial forestry and global
exports worldwide, increasing pressure on U.S. National Forests, too.
The agreements have created a secure and enforceable framework of international
rules from which global corporations can enter new markets. As corporations
search the planet for new markets, they have pushed governments to eliminate
trade and investment harriers. The result is further market integration
and stiffer competition which allows only those firms that vigilantly
suppress costs to survive.
Reducing expenditures for social and ecological safeguards (such as providing
safe working conditions or complying with environmental laws) can be an
easy way to boost a firm s competitiveness. In response to heightened
competition created by these new arrangements, governments have introduced
measures at the national level designed to boost the competitiveness of
domestic firms by increasing subsidies , deregulating logging practices,
and increasing access to forest resources.
The result is a public lands logging program that operates at a net loss
of nearly $1 billion each year. The American people pa~ for timber sale
administration, logging road construction and repair as well as damage
from floods, mudslides and forest fires caused by logging. Timber companies
contributions to these costs are minimal. From 1980 to 1991, the U.S.
Forest Service timber program operated at a net loss of $7.3 billion.
In fiscal year 1996, nearly $800 million was appropriated from the general
fund of the U.S. ‘1ieasur~ and another $532 million was spent from
off budget accounts fur the timber sale program. None of these receipts
were returned to the Treasury, resulting in a net loss to taxpayers of
at least $800 million. (Hanson, Chad, "Ending Timber Sales on National
Forests, The Facts," 1997.)
The replacement cost of a forest hundreds or thousands of years old is
incalculable. The considerable damage to watersheds, community water supplies,
fisheries, and to the tourism and recreation industries are not fully
considered in the Forest Service calculus. Some costs, however, can he
approximated. Logging is a primary cause of floods and mudslides, and
substantially increases the risk of forest fires. In fiscal year 1996,
$4-5 million was appropriated for the Forest Service s wildfire fighting
program and $830 million was spent in fiscal year 1997. As for floods,
the preliminary damage estimate of the 1996 winter floods was $538 million
for Oregon alone, much of which taxpayers covered through disaster relief
appropriations. In fiscal year 1996, S6ft8 million was appropriated for
"emergency supplemental" expenditures to repair roads and facilities
damaged by mudslides.
"The Forest Service budgeting process, which allows the Forest
Service to keep a percentage of the funds it realizes from timber sales,
provides an incentive for the Forest Service to sell timber below cost
or at a loss. Also, to maximize its budget, the Forest Service uses expensive
timber management and restoration techniques, such as clearcutting. Again,,
conflicting interests lead to perverse results: clearcutting provides
the Forest Service with a higher congressional subsidy because the Forest
Service can request preparation and administrative costs. Consequently,
decisions may be made, not because they are in the best interests of the
American people but because they benefit the Forest Service's fiscal interest."
—Chief Judge Boyce F. Martin, Jr., 6th Circuit Court of Appeals,
1997 decision regarding National Forests in Ohio. (Sierra Club v. Thomas,
105 F. 3rd 248 (6th Cir. 1997))
Past Attempts to Regulate Logging Have Failed
Recognizing the decline in healthy forests, other public lands and the
environment, Congress enacted several laws in the 1970s, including the
National Forest Management Act (NF\IA), the Federal Land Policy and \management
Act (FLPMA), the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the Endangered
Species Act (ESA), the Clean Water Act and the Clean Air Act. But the
timber industry, undeterred by federal agencies that depend on logging
revenues, continually circumvented these laws. It has taken litigation
brought by environmental organizations to suspend illegal logging. The
grounds for these court-ordered suspensions are summed up by Federal District
Court judge William Dryer s 1991 statement that federal land management
agencies were in "systematic and deliberate refusal to comply with
the nation s environmental laws." (Seattle Audubon Society v. Mosley,
798 V Supp. 1484, 1489 (WD. Wash. 1992))
"Controversy over federal forest management has prompted investigations
by Congressional committees, the General Accounting Office, and the Office
of Technology Assessment. These inquiries reveal that the Forest Service
and Bureau of Land Management lack adequate or up—to—date inventories
and monitoring programs. Without such programs, the agencies cannot assess
the success of replanted tree farms on the public's forest lands or the
quantity of mature timber available. Lacking such information, neither
the Congress nor the public can determine whether ongoing federal timber
sale programs meet legal standards for sustainable timber management.
This report describes how the lack of monitoring and outdated inventories
have prevented accurate determination of timber cutting levels, to the
detriment of America's forest heritage."
—Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, U.S. House of Representatives,
"Management of Federal Timber Resources: The Loss of Accountability,"
June 15, 1992.
In an attempt to evade court-ordered injunctions against illegal logging,
the timber industry and the Forest Service fabricated a "forest health
crisis." Despite pointing to a century of fire suppression, heavy
logging and road building as the cause of the problem, they called for
more of the same as the solution. The western wildfires of 1994 helped
the industry persuade Congress that the forests must be "salvage
logged" or lost.
The passage of a salvage logging amendment to a fiscal year 1995 Interior
Appropriations bill, known as the "salvage rider," is a dramatic
example of Congress, the timber industry, and the agency working in close
cooperation to increase the amount of logging on National Forests. It
allowed unrestricted clearcutting of publicly owned forests all over the
country — including the last ancient forests — under the guise
of salvage logging. The bill purported to respond to a forest health "crisis,"
but more than 50 forest experts across the country protested, pointing
out that clearcutting threatens soil, watersheds, fisheries and wildlife
— causing damage that vastly exceeds the impact of insects and fire.
The bill expressly overrode virtually all existing federal environmental
laws. It restricted judicial remedies, preventing citizens from gaining
relief in court to halt clearcutting — even if its effects threatened
water supplies, endangered protected species, caused erosion or imperiled
communities that depend on fishing and recreation.
In California alone, nearly one billion board feet of new timber went
on sale upon passage of the salvage rider. Sonic of the last roadless
areas in the National Forest System were put up for hid at way-below-market
prices, effectively privatizing public assets at a highly subsidized rate.
Nationally, 4.6 billion board feet of the most ecologically valuable timber,
including healthy, intact stands of rare old growth was sold under the
program, exceeding even the 3.8 billion board feet goal that Congress
had set. These sales gave rise to new rounds of protests and civil disobedience
in forest communities nationwide, resulting in thousands of arrests and
new demands for all end to all logging on public lands.
Subsidies Distort Timber Value
Private lands also suffer from subsidized National Forest logging. In
the Southeast, for example, the subsidies make it difficult for private
landowners to compete in the high—quality mature saw timber market.
As a result, chip mills, which produce material for wood pulp from trees
of any age and are fed almost exclusively by private lands, have proliferated.
Since private lands are virtually unregulated, the result has been accelerating
forest (destruction, degrading not only water quality, wildlife habitat,
and threatened and endangered species, but also the local forest—dependent
economy. Softwoods throughout the region have been over cut and both the
industry and the Forest Service predict that removal of hardwoods will
exceed growth within the decade.
The wood chipping industry encourages massive industrial-scale clearcutting
on increasingly shorter rotations unlike the solid wood sector which typically
uses select cutting on long rotations. Since they cannot compete with
the subsidized timber from public land, the solid wood producers are turning
to wood chipping. They are chipping the small-diameter trees that would
become the saw timber of tomorrow, if left to grow for another 30 years.
Employment is also affected. Studies show the best potential for job growth
within the forest products industry lies with solid wood manufacturing,
which is in ( we labor intensive than wood chipping.
If the National Forests no longer sold timber, the restricted supply
would increase the value of saw timber. Private landholders would then
have the economic incentives to use selection management on long rotations
to produce solid wood products. The excessive and unsustainable wood chipping
would cease.
Subsidies Depress Competition in Alternative Fibers
One out of every two trees cut in this country from private and public
lands is wasted through inefficient utilization and lack of recycling.
Despite the existence of alternative pulp fibers such as wheat straw,
bamboo, hemp and kenaf, one National Forest tree in three goes to pulp
and paper production.
Approximately 22 percent of the timber logged in National Forests goes
directly into pulp and paper manufacture. Another 10 percent is funneled
indirectly into pulp and paper in the form of lumber coproducts (chips,
sawdust, etc.). Pulp and paper is thus a major economic force driving
logging on public lands. Nonwoods currently make up less than 1 percent
of the U.S. fiber supply. By contrast, Nonwoods are the dominant source
of fiber in such countries as China and India. But farmers and other domestic
recycled and nonwood paper manufacturers cannot compete with the virtually
free fiber from the National Forests now available.
There is no shortage of nonwood fiber material in this country. U.S.
farmers annually generate an estimated 280 million tons of excess agricultural
fiber, suitable for papermaking. Generally these sources can be pulped
with higher fiber yields than wood and require fewer chemicals to be processed,
less water, and less energy.
If the flow of free fiber from the National Forests ceased, benefits
to benefits would include: new income from the sale of residues that would
otherwise be burned; new opportunities for value-added rotational crops;
new uses for over 65 million acres of idle farmland in the United States;
and new replacement options for declining industries such as tobacco.
In addition, fiber can be mined from landfills and kept out of them altogether
through recycling and conservation. For example, approximately 48 percent
of all U.S. hardwood lumber produced in 1992 was used to manufacture shipping
pallets. Fifty-four percent of these pallets are used just once, then
discarded in landfills. In fact, half the volume in the nation s landfills
is reusable, but wasted, wood and paper fiber.
Conclusion
America's remaining native forests, some of which include the last temperate
rainforests on Earth, are concentrated on publicly—owned lands entrusted
by the citizens of this nation to the care of the government. Ironically,
Congress and the Administration are encouraging efforts by timber corporations
to liquidate the last of these irreplaceable and biologically vital ecosystems.
Forests are a complex relationship between thousands of diverse plant
and animal species a result of millions of years of evolutionary processes.
They have endured fire, disease, insects, drought, and natural selection.
The North American continent was once blanketed with these rich and thriving
forests. Today, only scarce remnants exist. Once they are gone, these
self-sustaining forest ecosystems and the genetic base they house will
be lost forever.
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