Canada’s logging industry is seeking a wildfire ‘hero’ narrative – Burnaby Now

April 23, 2024

B.C. and Canadian forestry associations aim to tell a story that places them as the ‘hero’ in a fight against wildfires. One critic says the strategy is ‘mendacious and dangerous.’

On a rainy Friday this month, industry executives and government officials were sitting on the fourth floor of a Vancouver casino hotel. From the stage, a pitch for the future of forestry was on repeat: what if logging companies could be the heroes who saved British Columbia from wildfires?

Many of the speakers at the annual B.C. Council of Forest Industries (COFI) convention focused on how the sector could return to higher levels of harvest or slow the pace of government regulations. Then the conversation turned to wildfires.

David Coletto, head of the market research firm Abacus Data, presented the results from a poll he designed with COFI. After Canada’s most destructive wildfire season on record, the results suggested the B.C. public was ready to accept a narrative that the forestry industry could act as a saviour.