Dear Editor,
Re: "Letters: Trees are hard to save in Richmond amid development"
The letter by Dana Westermark really misses the point of protecting our environment. The piecemeal logic in his letter will assure the continued loss of species and biodiversity on this planet.
So, we lose a few more trees for housing! So, we lose a few more rivers to hydro dams or valleys to coal mining. So, we lose a few more birds to windows, house cats or oil sand developments. So, we lose a few more acres of agricultural land.
This thinking is destructive to life in our neighbourhood and on a planet that is overpopulated by humans and short on trees and wildlife!
The cumulative impacts of all of those insignificant losses of any of our living resources is resulting in an overall loss of life supporting ecological resources. This is despite our attempts at reforestation or other mitigation measures to offset the damage we are causing.
Mr. Westermark says we plant trees 600 million trees annually in Canada and 1.8 billion per year on this planet. So, why worry?
However, he misses the point that in 2022 in Canada we burned 1.7 million hectares of forest and assuming an average mixed forest density, that means we lost 1.7 billions trees in Canada in 2022.
In addition, we lost millions of trees to logging and land clearing for farms and housing.
Further to the above, global logging razed another 10 million hectares of forest and that is about the loss of 10 billion trees.
Half of that is not replanted because of roads, farms and housing development. Then, global wildfires destroyed billions of additional trees.
What we are destroying is several times greater than what we are replanting.
Does Mr. Westermark not appreciate mature trees near our home are valuable? Do we not need shade in an ever warmer world?
How about birds in our neighbourhoods?
Finally, should we not appreciate that trees can play a major role in combating global warming by sequestering carbon dioxide from our ever-warming atmosphere?
We have a shortage of housing. However, the real issue is that we have too many people in the world and many are moving here to live.
It is ironic that the more homes we build, the greater is the shortage and the more expensive they get! The trees are not to be blamed!
Blame our population growth policies and housing issues on our governments and ask them for more trees to be planted.
Meanwhile, others will blame farmland protection for our housing shortage. It's time to put the housing crisis into its proper perspective.
Otto Langer
Richmond
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