“Greenpeace is occupying this ship because it is loaded with
wood clearcut from the Great Bear Rainforest in Canada,” said Scott
Paul, Greenpeace forest issues specialist. “We are protesting the
ongoing destruction of the Great Bear Rainforest by the logging
company Interfor, whose wood is on this ship.”
Greenpeace is calling on the U.S. and Canada to save the
remaining ancient forests in North America. Canada’s Great Bear
Rainforest, in coastal British Columbia is North America’s largest
unprotected temperate rainforest. Of the 364 rainforest valleys on
Canada’s west coast, only 69 remain intact. Nearly all those that
remain are slated to be logged within the next decade.
Greenpeace has called on Interfor to stop logging in the
remaining rainforest valleys. The company temporarily stopped in a
few areas. However, Interfor continues to log and build roads in
many other rainforest valleys, including: Kumeon Lake, Klaskish,
and Stoltman Valley.
The U.S. is one of the largest consumers of wood products from
Canada’s Great Bear Rainforest, purchasing nearly two-thirds of the
wood.
“There are alternatives to using ancient forest wood,” said
Paul. “Thousand year old trees are ending up in products like
toilet paper, phone books and even cake mix. Greenpeace wants
consumers to find out if wood products they’re buying came from
ancient forests, and if it did, refuse to purchase it”.
Greenpeace is the leading independent organization that uses
peaceful and creative activism to protect the global
environment.
