WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration said July 15 it is ending large-scale, old-growth timber sales on the nation’s largest national forest — the Tongass National Forest in Alaska — and will instead focus on forest restoration, recreation and other non-commercial uses.
The announcement by the U.S. Forest Service reverses a Trump administration decision to lift restrictions on logging and road-building in the Southeast Alaska rainforest, which provides habitat for wolves, bears and salmon, and encompasses several communities totaling more than 70,000 residents.
Smaller timber sales, including some old-growth trees, will still be offered for local communities and cultural uses such as totem poles, canoes and tribal artisan use, the Forest Service said.
The Agriculture Department, which includes the Forest Service, also said it will take steps to restore the so-called Roadless Rule for the Tongass. The 2001 rule prohibits road construction and timber harvests with limited exceptions on nearly one-third of national forest land. The Trump administration moved last year to exempt the Tongass from the rule, winning plaudits from Alaska’s Republican governor and its all-Republican congressional delegation.
By reverse the Trump administration decision and restoring roadless-rule protections, officials are “returning stability and certainty to the conservation of 9.3 million acres of the world’s largest temperate old-growth rainforest,″ the Agriculture Department said.
Conservationists cheered the announcement, which the administration had signaled last month.
“Old-growth forests are critical to addressing climate change, so restoring roadless protections to the Tongass is critical, said Andy Moderow of the Alaska Wilderness League.
“With Alaska experiencing climate impacts more acutely than most, we shouldn’t be discussing the continued clearcutting” of a national forest long considered the crown jewel of the U.S. forest system, Moderow said.
U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski said the Biden administration was “literally throwing away” years of work by the Forest Service and Agriculture Department under former President Donald Trump.
“We need to end this ‘yo-yo effect’ as the lives of Alaskans who live and work in the Tongass are upended every time we have a new president, Murkowski said last month. “This has to end.”
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