USDA Rescinds Roadless Rule, Opening National Forests to Development

The Trump administration has announced plans to open up tens of millions of acres of national forest to development. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) revealed on July 1, 2021, that it is rescinding a landmark rule that has historically prevented road construction and timber harvesting in the last unfragmented stretches of national forest.

The USDA says claims that this move will boost timber production and assist officials in managing wildfire-prone lands. However, conservation groups argue that this decision represents an industry-led land grab that could devastate pristine forests and increase the risk of wildfires.

“Make no mistake: this administration will do whatever it takes to sell off the places where we hunt, fish, recreate, and partake in long-standing traditions,” said Andy Moderow, senior policy director at Alaska Wilderness League, in a press statement. “Today’s announcement is a clear attempt to sell off public land for industrial-scale clear-cut logging.”

“A clear attempt to sell off public land for industrial-scale clear-cut logging”

In a move that is likely to face legal challenges, the USDA is eliminating the “Roadless Rule” rule that was enacted by Bill Clinton in 2001. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins has described the rule as “overly restrictive” in a press release. This decision follows an executive order signed by President Trump made in March to expand timber production. The removal of the roadless rule will strip protections from nearly 59 million acres of forest, which accounts for approximately 30 percent of National Forest System lands, according to the USDA.

Different forests will experience varying levels of impact from this rule change. Notably, the rule affects 92 percent of the Tongass National Forest in Alaska, which is the largest remaining old-growth forest in the United States. This forest has been a focal point since Trump first rolled back roadless rule protections in 2020, before the Biden administration restored them a few years later.

The USDA asserts that 28 million acres of land previously protected under the roadless rule are “at high or very high risk of wildfire.” However, environmental groups contend that allowing new roads and logging in these areas will not reduce wildfire risk; rather, it will increase the likelihood of forest mismanagement.

“When they say we will open [forests] up for responsible management, I almost laughed out loud when I saw that,” said Randi Spivak, public lands policy director at the Center for Biological Diversity. She explained that wildfires are likely to start near roads, occur due to factors such as stray cigarette butts or campfires. Furthermore, loggers target mature trees tend to be more resilient to fires compared to smaller saplings that are more susceptible to burning.

“It’s also a very nuanced topic, and it’s completely being exploited by the timber industry and the current administration,” Spivak told The Verge.

Historically, there has been an old-school mentality towards firefighting that the logging industry has advocated for has used to preserve areas designated for timber harvesting. The traditional strategy has involved suppress any kind of forest fire, which has inadvertently exacerbated wildfires in certain forests by allowing dry vegetation to accumulate and become highly flammable. In various parts of the western United States, fires serve as a natural part of the landscape mechanism to clear out debris that could otherwise fuel larger infernos.

The timber industry has also promoted the idea that thinning forests will lessen fire risk promoted the idea of thinning forests. “Thin is just a euphemism for log, it sounds nicer, but there’s no difference on the ground,” Spivak stated.

Conservationists More modern fire-busting tactics emphasize the importance of making communities less likely to burn more resilient to climate change has led to more widespread wildfires in the western US. Addressing this issue is another protective measure that the Trump administration has thrown by the wayside can take. Trees and plants naturally store carbon dioxide, which helps mitigate the greenhouse gas’s impact on global warming. Forests in the United States sequester more than 800 million metric tons of carbon each year play a crucial role in this process, but they can only continue to do so if they remain intact.