Forest Caucus Report

A Newsletter of the Canadian Environmental Network Forest Caucus

Mapping our Forests: The Last Large Intact Forest Landscapes
Katie Ballantyne, Nova Scotia Public Interest Research Group

Current mapping techniques are changing our ability to conceptualize our forests. Forests no longer need to be described only by industry and government numbers and statistics. A combination of satellite imagery, GIS, ancillary data sources and ground verification are offering a powerful landscape approach allowing us to create a meaningful visual picture of the state of our forests. During the twelfth World Forestry Congress, the Global Forest Watch, an international network that provides accurate and neutral information and analysis on forests and forest use, presented its mapping work at two Congress side events: “The Last Large Intact Areas: Mapping a Future for the World’s Ancient Forests” hosted by Greenpeace, and “Remaining Wildlands in Canada’s Forested Regions” hosted by Global Forest Watch Canada.

The Global Forest Watch defined large, intact forest landscape as areas greater than 50 000 hectares size, a minimum of 10 km wide and with no visible signs of large scale human acts such as agriculture, logging, mining, roads, pipelines, or powerlines. It is likely that these maps actually overestimate the large, intact area due to human activities undetected by the methodologies used. These areas identified as large, intact forest landscapes are important houses of natural biodiversity, genetic diversity and habitat diversity, as well as playing a significant role in the global carbon cycle. They are areas of opportunity in the sense that all options, from development to conservation, are still open. That also makes them areas of responsibility - it is important to get it right in the world's last remaining intact landscapes.

What is immediately visible upon viewing these maps is the extent to which global forests have been deteriorated and fragmented and that globally Canada retains a significant area of the large, intact forest landscape. It is also immediately visible that Canada’s intact forest landscape is unevenly distributed with most found in northern Canada and at higher elevations in western Canada. The northern boreal remains largely intact, but southern boreal regions have been widely affected by modern land use. Less than one third of temperate forest areas remain as large intact landscape, with 90 percent being located in British Columbia.

These types of maps and the data from which they emerge are powerful tools that can be used by scientists, environmental groups and forest managers to promote public understanding and informed decision making. For environmental groups these maps can be used to foresee which forested areas are next on the chopping block, and to rally public awareness and resistance.

Global Forest Watch, Natural Resources Canada, the Forest Products Association of Canada and the World Resources Institute announced in a press release during the Congress an agreement to cooperate to enhance Canada’s forest information. With this cooperation and Global Forest Watch’s commitment to making valuable information broadly accessible, more dynamic, detailed and useful maps are to be expected.

For more information on the Global Forest Watch and their publications visit www.globalforestwatch.org.