Saving Canada’s Boreal Forest
STRETCHING
from interior Alaska across Canada to Newfoundland, and sandwiched
between the prairies and the Arctic, North America’s boreal forest is a
mind-boggling 1.5 billion acres in size — bigger even than the vast rain
forests of the Brazilian Amazon or the Congo. And despite the
relentless pace of development and industrialization worldwide, 80
percent of it remains wild and intact.
But
that doesn’t mean that this region of cold-hardy trees, lakes, wetlands
and tundra is safe. Corporations have their eyes on the land’s
plentiful resources of minerals, timber, oil and gas, and on the
hydropower potential of its many powerful, untamed rivers.
