Environmental Politics and Alaska's Timber Industry.

• Author: BONHAM, NICOLE A.
• Position: Statistical Data Included

Jack Phelps, Alaska Forest Association

Increasingly under environmental fire, strapped by the tightened belt of an uncertain future, Alaska's forestry industry is firing back from a latest round of attack--inclusion of Alaska's forestlands in a road-development ban on some 60 million federal forest acres nationwide.

Alaska Forest Association's Jack Phelps, executive director of the Ketchikan-based industry consortium, spoke with Alaska Business Monthly recently, detailing the fight against the road-ban action and forecasting the announcement's impact on the industry's five-year future.

ABM: With former President Clinton's January announcement to immediately ban road development on nearly 60 million acres of U.S. forestland--including lands in both the Tongass and Chugach-industry groups called the move a "shutdown." You've said the measure will likewise dramatically squeeze Alaska's timber industry. Facing a resulting allowable sale quantity of some 50 million board feet, what's the immediate plan of Alaska timber operators? Will existing contracts be honored to soften the blow, or will the effects of this mandate be apparent immediately? And how so?

Phelps: Under the rule, three categories of sales in "roadless" areas can proceed in the Tongass: first, timber sales already under contract; second, sales offered from a project for which an FEIS (final environmental impact statement) with a signed Record of Decision was issued prior to the publication of the new Roadless Rule; and third, sales offered from a project for which a DEIS (draft environmental impact statement) was noticed for public review prior to the publication of the new Roadless Rule. The last of these applies only to the Tongass. The first two are true for all national forests.

In theory, this means that the Roadless Rule should have little effect on timber harvest plans for the first year or two. However, business decisions are not made merely on short-term projections of the availability of raw materials. Knowing the supply is running out will surely have an effect on business planning and on available capital. Furthermore, there is added incentive for anti-development groups to file appeals and litigation to attempt to slow or stop projects that will be characterized as "destroying" the roadless character of areas the rule was intended to "protect." Such legal actions will add to the confusion and uncertainty in the industry and will have a chilling effect on investment.

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