“Greenpeace looks forward to working with Home Depot on the
implementation and enforcement of this policy,” said Mat Jacobson,
Greenpeace Forest Campaigner. “It is an exciting turn of events to
have the world’s largest do-it-yourself retailer emerge as an ally
in our fight to save all the world’s ancient forests, as well as
many other sensitive forest ecosystems. Our forest experts are
available to assist the company in achieving its laudable
goals.”
The company’s announcement that it will “stop selling wood
products from environmentally sensitive areas” comes after a
lengthy battle with Greenpeace, the Rainforest Action Network and
others over preservation of the world’s last ancient forests. These
ancient forests include areas from which popular Home Depot
products such as lauan (from Southeast Asian rainforests) redwood
(from California) and cedar (from Great Bear Rainforest of British
Columbia) are sourced.
“We’ve been working and waiting for this for several years and
feel it’s potentially a very significant step,” said Scott Paul, of
Greenpeace. “With Home Depot throwing down the gauntlet to its
competitors, we now anticipate that other U.S.-based home
improvement retailers will soon follow suit. At its current rate of
expansion, if Home Depot simply phased in certified, well-managed
wood and didn’t adequately address its overall consumption from
egregious, destructive sources-as it is doing with this pledge-then
its contribution to global forest destruction wouldn’t change.”
Half of the world’s forests have been completely destroyed, and
most of the remaining forests have been intensively logged. Only 22
percent of the world’s original forests remain in large intact
areas able to provide habitat for the full range of forest species.
The U.S. remains the largest single consumer of ancient forest
products worldwide, consuming approximately 9.5 billion board feet
of lumber per year-enough wood to make a board one foot wide by one
inch thick that would encircle the globe more than seven-and-a-half
times.
In November 1998, 27 leading U.S. corporations-including Kinkos,
IBM, 3M, Nike and Dell-announced their commitment to stop buying
products sourced from ancient forests. Europe’s largest
do-it-yourself store, B&Q, has nearly eliminated ancient forest
products from its shelves.
