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Travels with Larry Archive

Tembec, Resolute Agree to Protect Ontario Caribou Habitat

Montréal, Qué., Canada-based Tembec Inc. and Resolute Forest Products this week reached agreement with environment groups, northern towns, and a first nations community on a plan to protect a critical caribou habitat in northeastern Ontario, Canada, in the first of what the industry pledges will be a series of such deals across the country, according to a report by the Canada-based Globe and Mail news service.

Executives from both paper companies were among the partners who unveiled the agreement covering some 3 million hectares at a news conference at the provincial legislature last Thursday. The province must approve the plan, and Natural Resources Minister Michael Gravelle--who praised the effort--pledged speedy review, the newspaper reported.

According to the Globe and Mail, under the deal, some 835,000 hectares in the Abitibi River forest—an area roughly the size of Yellowstone Park in the U.S.—will be excluded from timber harvesting to protect the threatened woodland caribou, considered a bellwether species whose fate reflects the health of the ecosystem.

Tembec president Jim Lopez said the deal not only represents good environmental policy, but will ensure the company's sawmills have access to wood supply that will sustain operations for the foreseeable future. "The best plan for the environment is the best economic plan as well," he said, noting that Tembec will now work at implementing similar deals across its operations in Ontario, Quebec, and British Columbia under a two-year-old Boreal Forest Agreement that includes 19 companies and nine environmental groups.