If you care about our forests… Nina Newington on why the Forest Management Guide public consultation matters, and why you shouldn’t let its technical nature intimidate you.
Nina Newington: “What we need as a province and a planet is just what Marcus Zwicker described, multi-aged, multi-species forests. Such forests are capable of supporting whole ecosystems, including the mainland moose. What we are getting is the exact opposite.”
Seven of the 14 members of the Minister’s Advisory Committee on Forestry (MAC) last year wrote to the Minister of Lands and Forestry to request a moratorium on clearcutting on crown land, according to a Freedom of Information request received by the provincial NDP Caucus.
Forest protector Nina Newington on the injunction extension applied for by Westfor banning anybody from interfering with clearcutting anywhere where mainland moose can be found. “This means you, John and Jane Doe. You don’t have to be one of the people who was arrested. You don’t have to have visited the blockades. You don’t even have to be a member of Extinction Rebellion Nova Scotia. This injunction applies to you, whoever you are.
The fight to protect mainland moose from habitat-destroying clearcut activity by the WestFor Management consortium moved from blockades deep in the Digby County forests to the courtrooms of the Nova Scotia Supreme Court in Halifax. We spoke with several forest protectors protesting outside.
A 1981 report “An Evaluation of Moose Habitat In South Western Nova Scotia” provides all the evidence one needs to understand that the area should not be logged, writes naturalist Bev Wigney.
We spoke with naturalist David Patriquin about forestry’s ‘new focus on patches of old forests in Southwest Nova Scotia, ““If you were a woodlot owner who wanted to keep his woodlot for life, and for their children’s lives, all this would be a problem. These forestry companies are coming in and managing for profit. What incentive do they even have to manage it for the long term?”
A proposed Cape Breton clearcut within an area designated as a marten habitat management zone has been downgraded to a less impactful commercial thinning. “Nova Scotians should feel encouraged by this,” says Adam Malcolm, a Cape Breton naturalist who first raised the alarm. “Their voice really can in some cases make a difference.”
Jacob Fillmore, the young man camping out on the Grand Parade in support of the threatened mainland moose in Western Nova Scotia has been told by city staff to leave within a day or so. We talked with JAcob about his plans. “I don’t think this is the end of the protest,” Jacob tells us.
We spoke with Nina Newington, one of the forest protectors who were arrested while defending mainland moose habitat in Digby County from destruction. “I understand that for many people the arrests have been discouraging, but gosh, most struggles take a long time and many people around the world take far greater risks than we have taken and fight for far longer.”