Communities and companies alike are racing to prevent the axe from falling on the largest tree planting program in British Columbia’s history as the COVID-19 pandemic disrupts an industry that typically deploys thousands of workers across the province each year. 

This year was slated to see an increase in the number of trees planted, from roughly 250 million each year in the past decade to 310 million. Accomplishing this feat would require 5,000 seasonal workers to spread out across the province and work in isolated camps averaging 70 people or be housed in communities at motels or other facilities. 

“This year was going to be the big leap for us. Well it still is the big leap for us. And it just got a lot harder,” said John Betts, executive director of the Western Forestry Contractors’ Association, which represents tree planting companies throughout B.C.

Now the season is on hold as the industry works on a plan to keep workers and community members safe. 

On March 24, B.C.’s chief forester and assistant deputy minister Diane Nichols ordered a delay in the Interior planting season until May 4, even though the provincial government declared reforestation an essential service under its COVID-19 rules. The order to delay was made at the industry’s request to buy time to figure out what to do.

“The COVID-19 pandemic is creating huge uncertainty for everyone,” Nichols said in a statement, adding that “one of the main concerns for all parties is that the reforestation season proceeds successfully by implementing all reasonable measures to ensure the safety of workers and the communities they work in.”

Tree planting was already underway before the virus started to rapidly spread, and the work continues in coastal regions. But most of the seedlings — 230 million, or 75 per cent — are slated for B.C.’s Interior. That huge planting program may now be at risk.

Seedlings at K&C Silviculture, a major nursery operation in Oliver, B.C. Photo: Darcy McElveny

About $76 million has already been spent on growing seedlings in anticipation of B.C.’s most ambitious tree planting season on record. Photo: Darcy McElveny

Tree planting in a ‘blown out’ landscape

Quesnel Mayor Bob Simpson said the health of his community depends on new trees. The consequence of extensive wildfires near his community in recent years, including the largest fire in B.C.’s history, is a “blown out” landscape of dead trees, he said. That, combined with the large mountain pine beetle outbreak and extensive logging, has altered water tables and set the stage for potentially devastating floods.

A key to rehabilitating those lands is to get new trees growing on them.

But Simpson acknowledges that people in rural and First Nations communities are justifiably concerned about people from outside coming in and potentially spreading the virus.  

“The challenge for us is to figure out how to plan the congregating and marshalling of these crews in our community in a way that maintains their isolation from the general population,” Simpson told The Narwhal. “As a community, we owe it to ourselves to try and figure out what that could look like so that we meet two goals. One, we can enable the planting season. And two, we can still protect our community from people who are coming from away.”

Communities like Quesnel as well as the tree planting companies now have a bit of time to figure out what that might look like.

‘There’s no COVID on the cut block’

About $76 million has already been spent on growing seedlings, Betts said. The wages associated with planting those seedlings are easily double that, he added.

Rob Scagel, a reforestation consultant, said once the financial transactions between businesses in rural communities and the tree planters are considered, the economic value of this year’s planting season will exceed $220 million. But the big question is whether all or part of the planting season can go ahead given the delays and the extraordinary challenges posed by the pandemic.

The tree planting companies hope to exploit the one thing that typically defines the industry — isolation.

Usually, once planters are out in the field tromping through cut blocks, or logged-over areas, they are on their own for the day.

“They’re working by themselves, within 100 metres or so of the next person,” said Tony Harrison, part owner and director of Zanzibar Holdings, a tree planting company. “They’re working in isolation during the day, which is the norm, and there’s no COVID on the cut block.”

But isolating those workers during other parts of the typical work day will be onerous, as highlighted in a 12-page draft document being prepared by the Western Forestry Contractors Association to help guide companies should the planting season proceed.

The document stipulates that no one who has travelled outside the country will be allowed to plant trees without first self-isolating for three weeks. Everyone else will have to self-isolate for two weeks before going into the field. All workers will be required to file daily health logs that will be checked. 

Workers will travel in small groups to and from work sites in trucks that are disinfected twice daily, Harrison said. 

Betts said the groups will form “social isolation units” within the camp. In addition to travelling together, they will also eat their meals together. And they will not mingle with others in the camp. If anyone in the group gets sick, then they all go into isolation.

And the restrictions won’t stop there. Buffet-style eating at camps will be prohibited. Planters won’t be allowed to wash their own dishes, which will be done by dedicated kitchen staff instead. All “high-touch areas” in the camp — such as toilets, tables, rails, latches, switches, and door handles — will be disinfected with chlorine, hydrogen peroxide or ammonia twice daily. 

Perhaps most onerous of all, no one working in the camps will be allowed to leave on their days off, a rule that will apply to crews housed in motels and other buildings in or near communities.

To limit the boredom that would normally be relieved by periodic visits to nearby towns, tree planting camps “will be equipped with communication, entertainment and wireless services to ensure that workers are able to maintain communication with their families,” according to the document.

But tree planters, who are used to the communal life and camaraderie of the camps, are already expressing concerns about the emotional toll such restrictions will have. On a Facebook group for tree planters, one planter notes:

“I am concerned about the toll on mental health for planters being forced to both work in an isolation environment and also not group together in camp,” James Colalilo wrote in one post. “Even providing amenities and activities for days off, I am worried it will not be enough to keep up morale in an isolation setting . . . after the incubation period has passed in properly isolated camps, crews should be allowed to interact in order to keep everyone sane and happy.”

Three hurdles to be cleared 

Simpson believes there are at least three formidable hurdles to be cleared for the planting season to be salvaged. 

First, health authorities must sign off on the industry’s proposed guidelines. Second, First Nations will have to be fully consulted and consent to the industry operating nearby, but not within, their communities. 

Jordan Tesluk, a consultant to the tree planting industry on health and safety issues, said the latter point is essential. To alleviate concerns First Nations have expressed about the danger the virus poses to isolated communities, it’s essential that tree planters “avoid any and all contact with First Nations communities.”

The third hurdle is figuring out if there are places in or near rural communities where large numbers of tree planters could eat, sleep and shower while minimizing the risk of the virus being transmitted. 

Simpson said an isolated recreation facility that is currently closed could be that place in the Quesnel region. It has ample parking, vacant land beside it and shower and laundry facilities.

 “To me, that’s the kind of thinking we need to do as a community,” Simpson said. “We have an already closed space that could potentially accommodate the need to isolate these individuals and protect our community . . . [and] still enable a planting season to occur.”

Even if such arrangements are worked out, many of the trees slated for planting this year may not end up in the ground because the planting season has already been delayed.

One of the biggest compost piles in history?

For each week that planting is postponed, 15 million to 25 million seedlings will not be planted, Betts said.

Given the stringent restrictions that will be in place should the Interior planting season commence, Scagel believes “triage” will be necessary.

“The critical question is, what can we plant?” he said. “Are we going to plant 70 per cent to 80 per cent? And what are the critical sites that need to be planted?” 

Scagel believes “candidate sites” include long-neglected plots of land that were never satisfactorily reforested following devastating insect attacks or that were burned in fires that in some cases wiped out young trees that had been planted only years before. 

Betts warned that if the entire Interior planting season is scuttled, the result will be one of the biggest compost piles in history. The seedlings “cannot be brought back to life or put back into the freezer,” he said. “They simply will wind up being a tremendous waste.”

Meanwhile, the nurseries that grew all those tiny trees, which are now in freezers awaiting shipment, can only wait and see how things unfold over the next few weeks.

“I’ve been in this business for 20 years now — in Ontario, the U.S. and B.C. — and this is my first experience with something of this magnitude,” Darcy McElveny, manager of K&C Silviculture, a major nursery operation in Oliver, told The Narwhal. The nursery has more than 10 million seedlings in cold storage that could be at risk should the planting season be scrapped.

Darcy McElveny handles boxes of seedlings in cold storage at K&C Silviculture near Oliver, B.C.

Worse, should the pandemic stretch into the fall, it’s possible that not one but two seasons could be shot for nursery operators and tree planting companies.

“Regardless of what foresters ultimately do with the trees they have already bought, equal attention needs to be paid to nursery operations,” Scagel warned, noting that nursery workers, if they stay healthy, are supposed to sow another 296 million seedlings this year.

That is “an enormous amount of work that could be thwarted by an early fall rebound of COVID-19,” Scagel said.

Betts said the industry expects to hear soon from Minister of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development Doug Donaldson on whether the industry’s proposed guidelines have the support of the ministry and provincial health officials. 

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British Columbians have a complicated relationship with forests. Growing up, my favourite stand of old-growth trees was only accessible by a logging road. At the time, that barely seemed noteworthy: I knew forests held ecological value, and were also valued by local mills. But when the logging road became active again, and I started following empty trucks up and full trucks down, I began wondering whether those values were well balanced.

That tension still runs close to the heart of British Columbians. We promote our provincial identity as nature-lovers through old-growth forests on tourism ads. But in many ways, we never left the gold rush era of destructive, unsustainable industries that wreak havoc on the land. Meanwhile, the forest-based communities we cherish are increasingly at risk.

Forestry practices in B.C. have been criticized for a long time. Mill closures, forest fires and species extinction are all symptoms of disastrous forest policies and provincial government mismanagement. In today’s era of climate change, which is already having a measurable impact on forests, every bad policy is made worse.

Canada is warming twice as fast as the rest of the world, putting us on the frontlines of global climate change. But the time to “stop” climate change has passed. Now, we’re left bracing for the worst impacts of the climate emergency by adopting strategies to make our communities more resilient to increasing wildfires and devastating floods.

One of the most obvious strategies? Protecting the old-growth forests and intact forests — meaning landscapes not fragmented and degraded by industrial activity — still standing in BC.

Older, intact forests hold tremendous value to nearby communities by offering protection from the worst impacts of climate change. But not if we continue to clearcut one of our best defences. B.C.’s outdated forestry policies have undermined these values by prioritizing timber harvest over all else. It’s time to change that.

Old-growth forestry in the Nahmint Valley. Photo: TJ Watt / Ancient Forest Alliance

Resilient forests, resilient communities

Poor logging practices and industrial infrastructure threaten rural and urban communities alike. With provincial forest policy amendments underway, now is the time to make sure our communities get the conversation — and results — we need.

Until July 15, B.C. is seeking public input on key legislation, the Forest and Range Practices Act. A joint submission by 28 organizations puts climate change and landscape resiliency front and centre, defining resiliency as the “ability of an ecosystem to cope with disturbance or stress and rebuild itself without losing its defining characteristics.”

Recent years of unprecedented megafires and evacuations, catastrophic floods and landslides, and the march toward extinction of many woodland species make our situation very clear: we have work to do to rebuild resilient forests.

The act has governed forest operations on public land in B.C. for almost two decades — more than enough time to assess its flaws. This is a critical opportunity to tell decision-makers how B.C.’s forestry policies should change to help make our communities more resilient. If the provincial government is serious about tackling climate change, it must adopt policies that recognize the integral role forests play in that fight.

This means being explicit about what is logged and what is left standing. Clearcutting old-growth forests, which are globally significant for their ability to absorb carbon and are also home to countless species, cannot be a policy for a climate-safe future.

Unfortunately, B.C.’s current laws allow old-growth forests to be clearcut at an alarming rate. A recent analysis showed about 10,000 hectares of old-growth forest was logged in just one year on Vancouver Island. B.C. Timber Sales, a publicly funded agency, is poised to log thousands more hectares of old-growth on the island in the coming years.

In much of B.C., oversight and monitoring is so abysmal that understanding the scope of the problem presents its own challenge. But forest-dependent species like mountain caribou give us insight into the state of forest health. Right now, those herds face extinction: their disappearance from B.C. mountain ranges is linked with unsustainable forestry practices, and their continued decline marks the collapse in the integrity of forest ecosystems. But the provincial government is still delaying Indigenous-led efforts to recover herds and protect their habitat.

When B.C. forest policy reflects the need for healthy forests, our communities will be more resilient as well.

B.C. government delays endangered caribou plan as herds dwindle

Climate change makes bad forest policy worse, and vice versa

Old-growth and intact forests help buffer communities against threats made worse by climate change. Hotter, drier conditions in forests increase the risk of massive fires to rural and urban communities. As we enter fire season, that immediate threat is top of mind for British Columbians. We have to be proactive and build long-term solutions.

In parts of the interior — where natural fires historically helped maintain healthy forests — prioritizing timber harvest over all else motivated the 20th century fire-suppression practices that helped create diseased and dry tinderboxes. The widespread combination of clearcut logging, inadequate restoration of cutblocks and irresponsible forest policies led to the unnatural and unhealthy forest conditions that contribute to severe wildfires today.

That perfect storm of harmful forestry practices and climate-fuelled disasters has also hit communities another way — flooding. After being hit by a devastating flood, residents in Grand Forks pointed to overharvesting in the watershed as a contributing factor. As climate uncertainty increases in the years ahead, improved forest policies have to make up the gap.

While these practices might be the most efficient way to produce vast amounts of timber, they exacerbate the impacts of climate change, degrade forest ecosystems and decrease the amount of carbon stored in our forests. And in the end, these policies have damaged long-term economic prospects for communities, with the megafires of the past few years cited as a primary reason behind rampant mill closures. What many are now saying was a foreseeable outcome for those operations has left communities to cope with sudden upheaval — all in the absence of sound policy to ensure a hopeful future.

Grand Forks residents prep for winter in sheds, RVs after catastrophic flooding

B.C. needs your input

With less than one week left to submit comments on the Forest and Range Practices Act, now is the time to take action during this critical opportunity to shape B.C.’s new forest policy. It is vital for B.C. policymakers to hear from the people impacted by climate change — people who understand why protecting old-growth and intact forests will also protect communities from devastating wildfires and floods.

Landmark agreements aimed to protect old-growth forests in the Great Bear Rainforest and on Haida Gwaii have made the world see B.C. as a leader in sustainable forest policies. While that is not yet true, we can make it a reality.

We know the integral role forests play in the fight against climate catastrophe. It’s time for decision-makers to abandon harmful forestry policies and prioritize the resilience for forests and communities alike.

Learn more about what conservation groups are recommending for the Forest and Range Practices Act changes here, and fill out the B.C. government survey here.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

As I write this from my home office in Victoria, the air quality is 10+ or “very high risk” due to smoke from B.C.’s wildfires. I’m avoiding going outside at all due to asthma and am keeping all windows and doors shut.

As with many others, a sense of foreboding is settling in as I contemplate what summers will look like in 10, 20, 30 years from now.

The air quality in western Canada has been some of the worst in the world this past week. Flights and sporting events have been cancelled in the Okanagan and residents report near total darkness in the middle of the day in Prince George.

Already this summer, wildfires have killed at least 91 people in Greece, resulted in evacuations above the Arctic circle in Sweden and destroyed more than 1,000 homes in California.

None of this is a coincidence. The science is clear: heat-trapping greenhouse gases are warming the planet. More extreme heat, more severe droughts and more lightning strikes increase the frequency and intensity of wildfires.

While no single wildfire can be attributed to climate change, for years climate scientists have predicted hotter, longer wildfire seasons.

The number of wildfires sparked in Canada each year has doubled since 1970, according to Mike Flannigan, a professor in the Department of Renewable Resources at the University of Alberta.

“My colleagues and I attribute this to human-caused climate change,” he told The Narwhal. “I can’t be more clear on that. Human-caused climate change.”

While the media often fails to connect the dots between wildfires and climate change, could there be a more visceral reminder of what we’re doing to our planet than having to stay inside because the air is too dangerous to breathe?

Economic arguments shouldn’t only count when they’re promoting the expansion of fossil fuels. In 2017 alone, fighting B.C. fires cost nearly $560 million and some 65,000 people were forced to evacuate.

A healthy economic future can only exist with a healthy planet. Now — more than ever —  is the time to do everything in our power to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Earlier this year, the World Meteorological Organization released its 25th annual Statement on the State of the Global Climate, noting that the years 2015, 2016 and 2017 were warmer than any years on record prior to 2015.

The latest projections indicate the world is heading for a temperature increase of 3.2 C by 2100. Scientists estimate that 275 million people worldwide live in areas that will be flooded at 3 Celsius of global warming.

“[We] still find ourselves in a situation where we are not doing nearly enough to save hundreds of millions of people from a miserable future,” Erik Solheim, the UN environment chief, told The Guardian for this article featuring jaw-dropping maps of the flood zones.

You may not be alive in 2100, but chances are your children or grandchildren will be. What will you tell them you did in 2018, when there was still a chance of averting the worst of the climate catastrophe?

Let’s talk about what I mean when I say everything in our power. So often the argument is made that because we can’t solve the entire global climate crisis, we shouldn’t do anything. This is a race to the bottom. We couldn’t win the Second World War on our own either, but we still sent troops.

Each and everyone of us has a role to play in ensuring our own governments — local, provincial and federal — take action on climate change.

First and foremost, we can show support for governments who are sticking their necks out on climate change. At a time when many governments are backsliding on carbon taxes, this is more important than ever.

Here’s what you can do:

• If you live in Alberta, send an email to your MLA letting them know you support the implementation of a carbon tax and phase-out of coal-fired power and encourage them to do more to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Let them know they won’t have your vote in next year’s election without action on climate change.
• If you live in B.C., contact your MLA and let them know you support increasing the carbon tax and want them to heed the warnings in the auditor general’s report on climate change.
• If you live in Ontario, start organizing now to make sure a government receptive to taking action on climate change is elected next time around.
• If you live in another province or territory, contact your local politicians and let them know you support immediate action on climate change.

Perhaps most important of all, don’t lose interest in this topic as soon as the smoke subsides.

As the climate crisis ramps up, environmental coverage in major publications is ramping down due to layoffs of reporters. The Narwhal exists solely to cover Canada’s natural world — stay informed on climate change and other pressing environmental issues by subscribing to our free weekly newsletter.

Lastly, if these wildfires have woken you up to the climate crisis, please, whatever you do, don’t stop now. Stay informed. Talk to friends and family about the wildfire-climate connection and encourage them to stay informed as well.

In 1987, the world came together to protect the ozone layer. More than 98 per cent of ozone-depleting substances have been phased out and the hole in the Antarctic ozone is shrinking.

The world has worked together to solve big problems before. And we can do it again.

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.

By Ed Struzik for The Tyee.

While doing research for a book I was writing on wildfire, I posed two questions to a number of experts: “Do you think there will be another Fort McMurray-like fire in the future? If so, where do you think it will happen?”

Everyone agreed on the first question. Fort McMurray was not an anomaly. It will happen again, sooner rather than later, and likely with deadly consequences.

The responses to the second question varied. University of Alberta wildfire scientist Mike Flannigan had many First Nations communities, Prince George in British Columbia and Timmins in northern Ontario high on his list.

Cliff White, a former Parks Canada scientist and one of the architects of the agency’s wildfire management program, suggested that Sulphur Mountain in Banff could burn, endangering thousands of hikers and tourists.

Wildfire scientists Brian Stocks and Marty Alexander cast a broader net. They suggested that hundreds of communities are at risk.

Glenn McGillivray, the managing director of the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction, offered the most surprising response. He had Victoria and Vancouver on his list. (If you think McGillvray is exaggerating, consider the fact he predicted in a blog that a fire would threaten Fort McMurray two years before it happened.)

As this year’s fire season in British Columbia has demonstrated, the experts I talked to were right in answering the first question. Time will tell whether they will be right in answering the second. But they will almost certainly be.

The province of B.C. declared a state of emergency on July 7, 2017 due to wildfires. Photo: Province of B.C.

Bigger, Hotter, Faster

The last decade has been the warmest continent-wide. Hotter weather dries the forest and produces more lightning. Lightning is responsible for most of the biggest wildfires that occur in Canada, although people cause more wildland fires than lightning strikes.

More people are living, working and recreating in the forest. There are more mature trees in the forest landscape as a result of decades of aggressive firefighting efforts. Tens of millions of these trees are dead or dying thanks to insects and disease that strike aging trees and the warming that is taking place.

It all adds up to fires burning bigger, hotter, faster and more often.

Everyone agrees that this will result in more evacuations, more homes and businesses being burned, more roads and recreation areas being closed, more smoke imperilling the health of people, especially the young, the elderly and those with respiratory problems. First Nations, which represent only four per cent of the population, will be hit especially hard. They are already affected by a third of the evacuations that take place in a given year.

Water quality will also suffer. The carbon that spills into the river systems can seriously compromise water treatment facilities, especially in places such as Victoria that do not filter water because the high quality water supply does not require them to do so.

Members of the RCMP search the wreckage of the Fort McMurray wildfire in 2016. Photo: RCMP

Fort Mac Sparked Little Change

Fort McMurray should have been the catalyst for changing the way we deal with wildfire. That blaze sent approximately 88,000 people fleeing their homes, offices, hospitals, schools, and seniors’ residences. By the time rains and cooler temperatures helped firefighters contain the fires, 2,800 homes and buildings were destroyed. Nearly 1.5 million acres burned. Insurance losses were expected to amount to $3.77 billion. The total cost of the fire, including financial, physical, and social factors, is likely to be $8.86 billion.

But has anyone in government been listening?

The government of Ontario has embarked on a policy that will allow some fires to burn themselves out so long as they don’t threaten people and commerce. This policy, which preceded Fort McMurray, will go a long way toward making forests there resilient.

But that’s just about it for the bold strategies that outgoing B.C. Premier Christy Clark and her provincial colleagues seemed to call for last year when they supported the idea of a national wildfire strategy. That’s gone nowhere.

The government of Alberta’s response so far to recommendations from an expert review panel that investigated the Fort McMurray fire has been muted at best. More money has been allotted to the FireSmart Program, which helps communities thin urban-edge forests, remove burnable fuel on the ground and around homes, and create defendable boundaries from which fires can be fought.

But it’s not nearly enough. And as Marty Alexander points out, a good chunk of the funding was given to Fort McMurray where the fires of 2016 have already removed most of the dangerous fuels from the ground.

Alberta has strengthened some wildfire protection laws but not those that matter most. The government has been reluctant to enforce existing laws (closing forests in times of extreme drought and heat) that minimize the chance of fires igniting. Alberta has promised to improve fire weather forecasting, but has offered few details.

Image of raging fire 16 kilometres south of Fort McMurray in 2016. Photo: CTV News Youtube screenshot 

Instead of recognizing the dangers that lie ahead, the Alberta government has chosen to treat Fort McMurray as an “extreme event.” It’s not the only government that is guilty of doing this.

Lost in the collective memory of the politicians who rotate in and out of office are the so-called extreme wildfire events of the recent past which are not so rare anymore: Salmon Arm, B.C. and Virginia Hills, Alberta in 1998; the Chisholm and House River fires of 2001 and 2002 in Alberta; West Kelowna, Okanagan Mountain Park, Kootenay, Banff, Jasper, Crowsnest Pass in 2003; the Yukon in 2004; La Tuque in northern Quebec in 2010; Slave Lake and the Richardson fires in 2011; northern Quebec in 2013; the Northwest Territories in 2014; the 2015 fire season, which was the most intense fire season of the century in western North America.

As the current situation in B.C. is demonstrating once again, these extreme events are now the new normal. In Canada, wildfires that burned more than 200,000 hectares of forest happened only four times between 1970 and 1990. Since then they have done so 12 times.

The provinces are not totally at fault. The federal government has done little to support forest science. The Canadian Forest Service used to employ 2,400 people. It now employs about 700. Most of the service’s research money goes to the study of insect infestations that impact the timber industry. The total funding is justified given the nature of the problem and the value of the industry. But less than eight per cent goes to fire research.

“Given the relative importance of fire and insects in Canadian forests, how is this disparity possible?” asks Brian Stocks, who had a long career in the forest service.  

Bigger, Hotter, Faster: Canada’s #Wildfires are Changing and We’re Not Ready https://t.co/cX2EH9KHGO #bcpoli #bcwildfire #climate @kujjua

— DeSmog Canada (@DeSmogCanada) July 17, 2017

People in and out of government kept telling me that the important thing about Fort McMurray was that no one died. They are right to an extent, but they are also wrong because loss of life is not necessarily the best way of measuring success. Fort McMurray was the worst natural disaster in Canadian history. It could have been much worse if so many things — wind, demographics (Fort Mac has relatively few elderly people), safety training (most everyone in the oil sands industry knows what to do in an emergency), quick and creative thinking, heroism and outright luck — hadn’t aligned in the manners they did.

Fort McMurray dodged a lot of bullets, as the town of Slave Lake did in 2011 when everyone had to evacuate at the last minute. Those in the line of fire in the future may not be so fortunate if the provinces and the federal government fail to come to grips with the mounting challenges.

The blueprint for the future was spelled out in 2005 when Brian Stocks and a veritable who’s who of wildfire experts were asked by the Canadian Council of Forest Ministers to come up with a new wildlands fire strategy. Most of those recommendations have been ignored.

Ed Struzik’s book Firestorm, How Wildfire Will Shape Our Future is being published by Island Press in Washington, D.C and distributed in Canada by the University of British Columbia Press in October 2017.

Image: Canadian Armed Forces survey B.C. wildfires from the air. Photo: MCpl Gabrielle DesRochers, Canadian Forces Combat Camera via Flickr

The Narwhal’s reporters are telling environment stories you won’t read about anywhere else. Stay in the loop by signing up for our free weekly dose of independent journalism.