Rep. Bruce Westerman (AR-04)
It’s time for the federal government to stop fiddling while America burns. According to the National Interagency Fire Center, over 40,000 fires have burned nearly 4 million acres across the United States so far this year.
We’ve seen countless American lives upended by wildfire. Families have lost loved ones, communities have lost homes and businesses, and thousands of firefighters risk their lives to protect their friends and neighbors.
Congress has a role to play in preventing further catastrophe caused by wildfire. Eighteen months ago, the Fix Our Forests Act passed out of the House with an overwhelmingly bipartisan vote of 279-141. From working to accelerate hazardous fuel reduction in our highest-risk forests, utilizing state-of-the-art science to treat our forests, and streamlining processes that reduce cost while still maintaining environmental standards, this bill does so much to invest in the forests we love.
Through healthy forest management practices, we will see a drastic decrease in wildfire risk.
It’s incredible that, while we are a nation filled with an abundance of timber, we look beyond our borders to import timber products. In fact, the Observatory of Economic Complexity reported that the year-on-year exports from the United States for paper goods decreased by 6.52% while imports increased by 8.82%. Because of this trend in relying on foreign imports, we are severely limiting our domestic manufacturing capabilities for lower-value and residual wood.
With too many trees and too few markets, we’re seeing our lumber supply chain impacted and the cost of paper products increase. But more seriously, we’re witnessing hardworking Americans lose their jobs.
Because of this, I’m proud to continue working diligently in Congress to broaden the avenue for greater opportunity for our domestic timber supply. Since 2014, we’ve seen at least 37 pulp mills close. These mill closures have directly impacted their local communities, contributed to overgrown forests, and led us to where we are now with more timber growing than we’re harvesting.
By utilizing this abundance of timber for new, innovative forest-derived products, and strengthening our domestic supply chain, we’d be able to generate billions of dollars in sales and manufacturing across the forest products industry on a national level. And the rural communities that depend so heavily on the timber industry could see millions invested, in return.
Now, Congress has the chance to fix our forests and invest in our communities. Through commonsense legislation like the Fix Our Forests Act and revised administrative policies on trade and business development, we can get to work to revitalize our nation’s forests and address the forest health crisis we’ve created.
