Ontario wants to exempt the…

Ontario wants to exempt the logging industry from Ontario’s Endangered Species at Risk Act until at least 2020.

The logging industry moves fast. Huge tracts of land are deforested at incredible speeds. By 2020, Ontario's boreal forests will be unrecognisable. Much of it will be lost. Boreal forest does not regrow when removed by an artificial "control" like logging. It is replaced (slowly) by non-boreal forest. That's what boreal is. It started growing at the end of the last ice age, is periodically damaged by natural controls such as fire and insects, and regrows as boreal forest. Logging, on the other hand, is not natural, and does not allow for the natural regrowth of boreal forest.

Ontario's boreal forest is the natural habitat of at-risk and endangered species such as the caribou. The Endangered Species at Risk Act was created to protect these animals, and that means protecting their habitat.

No industry should be exempt from such crucial legislature. Ontario's boreal forests are part of Canada's boreal forests, a very special and rare thing. Once gone, it's gone.

Logging should not be deemed "special" and exempted from the criteria of the Act. It should be deemed a threat, and be leashed immediately, not given another 2 years to run amok.

[Original Comment ID: 212544]