Phred Dvorak
May 18, 2010

TORONTO - Timber companies and environmental groups said Tuesday they agreed to work together on a conservation plan for 170 million acres of boreal forest in northern Canada, in what both sides called the largest and most significant deal of its kind.

The agreement brings together 30 companies and organizations, from logging giants Weyerhauser Co. and AbitibiBowater Inc., to environmental activist Greenpeace. It calls for a three-year suspension of logging on 75 million acres of land while the parties hammer out a permanent plan to protect endangered caribou there. It also gives the group three years to come up with and implement mutually acceptable standards for logging the remaining unprotected land.

In return, environmental groups say they will call off boycotts and campaigns while the planning process continues.

"It really is a truce after many years of fighting each other," said Richard Brooks, Greenpeace's forest-campaign coordinator, at a news conference in Toronto.

Environmental groups say the agreement is important because it advances conservation in what is already one of the world's most forest-friendly countries. Canada has around a third of the world's boreal forests—northern stretches of mostly coniferous wood such as pine and spruce, said Steve Kallick, director of the Pew Environment Group's International Boreal Conservation Campaign. With this agreement, about two-thirds of that will be covered by commitments or plans for conservation and sustainable development, he said.

Timber companies say the agreement will help them in the long run, even if the logging suspension is inconvenient initially. The environmental groups have agreed that it's important to keep the corporate mills supplied with fiber during the three-year talks, said Avrim Lazar, chief executive of the Forest Products Association of Canada, which represents the 21 companies signatory to the agreement. Those companies employ 200,000 people and comprise 70% of Canada's boreal forest operations.

The agreement lays the foundation for faster and smoother negotiations between all parties on logging that acreage, which could ultimately mean quicker access to the wood, Mr. Lazar says. It also strengthens the companies' "green" credibility—an important marketing tool at a time when most timber companies are struggling to make money.

"There's been a failure in the marketplace to get credit for what we've done [to log sustainably] because the environ groups were saying it's not enough," Mr. Lazar said.