Scientists Urge Half of Canada Forest Be Protected

May 15, 2007 — By Randall Palmer, Reuters

OTTAWA -- Canada's vast forests should be protected much more than they are now to preserve wildlife and water and to fight global warming, a group of 1,500 scientists from around the world said Monday.

The scientists say Canada's Boreal Forest, stretching from the Alaskan border and running north of the plains all the way to Newfoundland on the Atlantic, is one of largest intact forest-and-wetland ecosystems remaining on earth.