At a fundraiser on March 17 at the Sooke Harbour House, local area business people and interested conservationists came together to raise funds for an information centre in Port Renfrew.
The solution: that the lands of Mary Hill, Race Rocks, and the undeveloped portions of William Head and Rocky Point be designated a National Conservation Area. This should be part of a larger canvas— a South Vancouver Island National Park Reserve—which would include parks in East Sooke, Albert Head, and Fort Rodd Hill connected to the Juan de Fuca Marine Trail system and an expanded Pacific Rim National Park Reserve.
The aim of the free-drink-and-free-appetizer event at Sooke Harbour House is to increase tourism to monumental trees around Port Renfrew.
The environmental advocates with the AFA have worked steadily at publicizing the site of old growth trees they became aware of in late 2009. Some of the cedar and spruce trees located there are reportedly among the oldest and largest on the continent.
"We’re always interested in environmental stories," said al Jazeera producer Jet Belgraver, on the phone from Toronto. The story, which will air Saturday, aims to give global viewers "a bit of a reality check" about B.C. logging practices.
Watch the news clip from Al Jazeera, one of the largest TV news networks on Earth that reaches 220 million homes in over 100 countries, who have just featured the Ancient Forest Alliance’s campaign to protect British Columbia’s endangered old-growth forests and the Avatar Grove on Vancouver Island.
The campaign to protect BC�s old-growth forests is about to get an unprecedented level of global exposure! Al Jazeera, one of the largest TV news networks on Earth that reaches 220 million homes in over 100 countries, will feature a news piece tomorrow (Saturday) about the Ancient Forest Alliance�s campaign to protect British Columbia�s endangered old-growth forests and the Avatar Grove on Vancouver Island.
Al Jazeera English is actually available to 220 million homes in more than 100 countries around the world, which is what has local environmentalists excited.
An Al-Jazeera news crew toured the endangered Avatar Grove, the San Juan Spruce (Canada’s largest spruce tree), and clearcuts near the town of Port Renfrew on southern Vancouver Island last week with Ancient Forest Alliance activists Ken Wu and TJ Watt, and subsequently interviewed BC’s Forests Minister Pat Bell.
"This will be the biggest international news hit for the old-growth campaign in a long time," Ken Wu of the Ancient Forest Alliance said Thursday. "There is a strong international market for environmental issues, particularly one that is very charismatic."
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