Logging company AbitibiBowater controls the largest tracts of publically-owned forest in the provinces of Quebec and Ontario in Canada, a total of 24 million hectares (59 million acres). Less than 35% of this area remains intact – most of it has been degraded by logging roads and massive clearcuts. Much of these forests have been turned into newsprint, book and catalogue papers, inserts and junk mail.
AbitibiBowater does very little to protect important wildlife habitat for threatened species such as woodland caribou and migratory birds. In fact, less than 3 percent of the land under AbitibiBowater’s management is protected from logging in Québec, and less than 6 percent in Ontario.
We are urging the company’s president and CEO to stop logging the remaining intact areas of the Boreal Forest under AbitibiBowater management.