Media Roundup: The Landmark Boreal Conservation Agreement
May 19th, 2010
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| Watch ForestEthics Executive Director Todd Paglia featured on Canada's Global National TV. |
Yesterday's unveiling of the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement marked a historic moment in the fight to protect the world's most critical forests. It commences with a three-year moratorium on logging across more than 70 million acres – an area the size of Colorado. It also begins the negotiations to assess an area the size of Texas or France – 172 million acres – and to reach consensus on lasting protection for the Boreal Forest land, the preservation of woodland caribou, and world-leading green forestry practices.
Needless to say, the press picked up on it.
The handshakes at yesterday's press conference were the result of many years of strategic marketplace pressure, and as ForestEthics Executive Director Todd Paglia told the Toronto Star, it took more than "kumbaya" to bring seven environmental organizations, two foundations, and 21 large timber companies to the same table:
"It’s very easy for people to say: This is a new model (for agreement); people should just be getting along," he said. “It’s actually not true. What people should be doing is having rigorous conflict and also trying to find out, what is it they can say Yes to. I think that’s what we’ve done."
The Economist also quoted Paglia in their excellent feature story about how our successful markets campaign against Victoria's Secret and subsequent collaboration with parent company Limited Brands helped make the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement possible:
"If you want to talk to the logging company they will laugh you out of the room in two minutes,” says Mr Paglia, “but if you bring Victoria’s Secret, Office Depot, or Staples, everything changes.”
Ian Austen of the New York Times cited ForestEthics and other groups' linking of the American marketplace with the logging of the Boreal, while the Guardian UK called the agreement 'unprecedented'. Canada's Globe and Mail credited the market shifts catalyzed by "heavyweights" including ForestEthics.
Global National TV ran a feature on the announcement featuring Executive Director Todd Paglia and the Victoria's Dirty Secret campaign, while CTV connected the agreement to British Columbia's Great Bear Rainforest and the battle to stop the Tar Sands filled Gateway pipeline from running through it – all areas where ForestEthics is actively engaged.
(Speaking of 'engaged': if you haven't already take action and pledge to be a Boreal Watchdog!)
More media here: Reuters, the Associated Press, the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, the BBC, the Los Angeles Times, the Financial Post, CBC News, the Vancouver Sun, the Montreal Gazette, Discover Magazine, Environmental Leader, Now Toronto with more to come...
