Corporate forestry in the Sierra

Sierra Pacific Industries (SPI), one of the largest timber companies in the U.S. and the second largest private landowner ranked 155 on the Forbes 500 list of private companies in the U.S in 1999. Sierra Pacific Industries currently owns 1,504,481 acres of land, all of which is located in California north of Yosemite National Park. In 2001 SPI was largest purchaser of federal timber nationwide and every year is among the top purchasers.

In recent years, Sierra Pacific has increased the number of acres that it clear-cuts. Tian-Ting Shih of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CDF) calculates that from 1992 to 1999, the acres that SPI clear-cut increased from 943 to 23,823, a 2,246% increase. From 1982 to 1999, SPI clear-cut about 70,000 acres.

The state's largest timber company is shifting its logging practices from selective thinning of forestland to clearcutting using a technique called "visual retention" on 70 percent of its 1.5 million acres, about 3.7 percent of forestland in California. Variable retention is a harvesting technique that can use either dispersed or grouped tree retention with the clearcut size under grouped retention and the amount of retained trees under dispersed retention dependent upon unit size. Under group retention there will be units or areas of bare ground larger than the current 20-40 acres of clearcuts allowed under the Forest Practice Rules.

Today, Sierra Pacific Industries obtains about half of the timber for its mills from its own private industrial timberlands. However, SPI continues to buy federal timber to supplement these sources. In 1985, SPI obtained 88% of its raw materials from National Forests. Because SPI is so big and has so much cash, it has long been able to outbid other companies for federal timber. SPI need not make a large profit on federal timber, but just enough to invest in development of timber resources on its own land. Meanwhile, as the SPI practice of overbidding deprives smaller companies of timber, the competition goes out of business. Some environmentalists would argue that the artificially low prices of federal timber actually allow larger companies like SPI to gain an advantage over smaller companies.

In a recent press release, Rainforest Action Network included Sierra Pacific Industries among the "Dirty Dozen" of top loggers of U.S. national forests, the largest importers and distributors of endangered, old growth forest products, the worst converters of native forests to monocultural plantations, and the leading manufacturers of non-recycled, virgin tree paper.

Local groups in the Sierra, such as Ebbetts Pass Forest Watch, Lassen Forest Preservation Group and the Forest Issues Group, continue to monitor SPI Timber Harvest Plans and Forest Service projects, and their cumulative impact on important watersheds of the Sierra.