> This is because we gradually cut it all down over a long period of time, presumably on the iterated basis that there was a lot of it and that cutting down a few square miles was really not a big deal.

This feels like a critique of the parent, but if so it ignores the key point: BC's forests cover 230k square miles [0]. The entire island of Great Britain is only 80k square miles, 15% of which (12k square miles) was estimated to be forest in 1086 [1].

To put this in perspective: If British Columbia deforested itself at the rate Britain did (an average of 9 square miles of forest lost per year), it would take 25 thousand years to finish the job.

Yes, BC needs to log responsibly, like everyone else. But "responsibly" for BC has a very different definition than it does for Britain, and imposing British sensibilities on Canadian logging isn't useful.

[0] https://www.for.gov.bc.ca/hfd/pubs/docs/mr/mr113/forests.htm

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/travel/2013/jul/27/history-of-en...