The Department of Agriculture (USDA) issued a memo on Friday allowing the use of more than 112 million acres of national forests for logging to increase timber production and reduce wildfire risk.
In the memo dated April 3, USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins declared these forests—making up 59 percent of national forests—to be in an emergency situation due to their high risk of wildfires and hazardous tree conditions. The memo was released on April 4.
Rollins stated that the national forests are in crisis due to “uncharacteristically severe wildfires, insect and disease outbreaks, invasive species, and other stressors.”
Those threats—combined with overgrown forests, the growing number of homes in the wildland-urban interface, and decades of rigorous fire suppression—have contributed to a “full-blown wildfire” and “forest health crisis,” according to the memo.
“Healthy forests require work, and right now, we’re facing a national forest emergency,” Rollins said in a statement. “We have an abundance of timber at high risk of wildfires in our National Forests.”
The emergency designation would allow the Forest Service to expedite approval for logging activity in the designated forests, bypassing the usual processes required under national environmental laws.
The memo directs Forest Service personnel to increase timber production by