Okanagan activist says loggers use fire mitigation as a ‘Trojan horse’ for profit

A Peachland environmental activist says logging companies use fire mitigation for profit while continuing practices that make fires worse as the industry struggles.

Taryn Skalbania is the co-founder of the Peachland Watershed Protection Alliance, and she said the logging industry’s participation in fire mitigation is more about profit than reducing the impact of wildfires. 

“The minute you’re going in with machines and pulling out trees and pretending to be firescaping, what you’re doing is logging. It’s just a Trojan horse and it’s a cash grab,” she said. 

The BC Wildfire Service said working with the logging and forestry sector is an essential part of fire mitigation. 

“Working with the forest sector is one of the most effective ways to tackle wildfire risk to BC communities at scale. Building wildfire resilience in BC would not, and will not, be possible without working with the sector as a partner,” the wildfire service said in an emailed statement. 

Skalbania said that there is a conflict of interest with the logging industry’s input on community safety since the industry is struggling and any reason to harvest more wood is a welcome one.

“They are a business to cut down trees. So it would be like trusting Coca-Cola for dental advice, or Benson and Hedges for lung health advice,” she said. “They need their jobs, and they need to protect the reputation of those jobs.”

It’s no secret the logging industry is struggling right now with multiple mill closures in recent weeks, like the Domtar mill that shut down on Vancouver Island affecting at least 350 people. 

Skalbania said that as the industry is struggling it has been finding ways to harvest more timber, including in the name of fire mitigation. She said numerous logging practices still make fires worse like clear cutting, leaving debris on the forest floor to become fire fuel, creating roads deeper into the woods for humans to access and cause fires, and so on. 

“The minute you change the canopy of a forest, it makes things drier and so much easier to burn down,” she said. 

President Donald Trump’s tariffs are just the latest problem the forestry industry said is causing its decline. Skalbania said it’s just an excuse. 

“Donald Trump’s tariffs or the pine beetle, or it’s wildfires, before it was environmentalists, and sometimes it’s red tape. They have more excuses than the Pope, honestly. It’s maddening,” she said. 

There are critics like Skalbania out there but the BC Wildfire Service said loggers and the forestry industry are important on the ground and in the planning process for tackling disasters. 

“At a boots-on-the-ground level, forestry contractors frequently support wildfire response operations – as machine operators, line locators and fallers,” the wildfire service said. “Away from the front lines, a joint panel between the BC Wildfire Service and the Forest Professionals of BC is collaborating on developing guidance and standards for forest professionals to integrate wildfire management into forest planning and practices.”