Forests at the two ends of the continent: A comparison of Chilean and Canadian forestry

August 20, 2025

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• Boreal Forest
• Forests
• Public Lands
• Rocky Mountain and Foothills Forests
• WLA Archive

 

By Matías Eloz Huidobro

Read the PDF version here.

 

Matías is a Forestry Engineering student at the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. He participated in AWA’s international internship program from January to March.

Each day, forests provide us air and water purification, temperature and biogeochemical cycle regulation, soil structure, run-off control after rainfalls, habitat for flora, fauna and fungi, and even landscape and recreational areas. These ecosystem functions create conditions for us to survive.

Beyond that, from furniture to paper and even diapers, much of modern Western society is sustained by the natural resources we extract from forests. Those products make us realize that, despite the destruction caused by the forestry industry in nature, humans have come to rely on this resource. So, how can we transform this industry to make it more sustainable, ensuring that future generations can benefit from these resources without degrading the habitat of other species?

In Alberta, 58 percent of the province is covered by Boreal Forest,10 percent by Foothills and 7.4 percent by the Rocky Mountains. Each area is subject to logging, which carries the risk of cumulative environmental impacts from human activity. Therefore, it’s important to implement management plans including adequate protection for flora and fauna based on their specific ecological needs.

By comparison, 14 million hectares, or around 19 percent, of Chile is covered by native forests and three million hectares by exotic forestry plantations — four percent of the total surface. Its forestry industry is developing rapidly, primarily based on exotic species, exporting wood products to the USA and other parts of the world. Despite this, up to 22 percent of Chile’s surface is protected by law as Protected Areas (including deserts, mountains, peatlands and forests), highlighting the importance of the different ecosystems in Chile.

Comparing these two regions — Alberta and Chile — on opposite sides of the North and South American continents might offer insight into their different ecosystems and how each nation has implemented policies to enhance environmental conservation within the forestry sector.

Forests in Chile

Chile is a long country on the west coast of South America, characterized by a vast coastline, the Andes Mountain Range, and fertile soils in its valleys. It has eight distinct vegetation regions, from the most arid desert in the world (the Atacama Desert), to the Sclerophyll Forest in the central zone (found in only five areas of the world and influenced by Mediterranean weather), and dense forests to the south.

Since pre-Hispanic times, central and southern Chile was covered by forests maintained by Indigenous people, the Mapuches. They practiced shifting cultivation, where two hectares of native forest would be cleared and transformed into croplands for two to three years. Afterwards, they would move to another patch, allowing the previous one to regenerate, making a sustainable system that coexisted with forests.

During the colonial period, the Spanish settled in the territory, founding the main cities: La Serena in the north, Santiago in the central zone, Valparaiso as the main port, and Concepción in the central-southern area.

This development led to overexploitation of native forests, with the logging of Tamarugo, Algarrobo, and Espino to produce natural coal to power trains used for copper transportation from mines to cities. Additionally, there are records of logging in the Maipo Valley, which was completely deforested to obtain wood products for the growth of Santiago.

As time passed, violent conflicts between the Spanish and Indigenous people, particularly the Mapuches, resulted in the privatization of the land in southern Chile, starting a process of landscape degradation and land-use change. The valleys were cleared by fire to establish croplands to feed the surrounding countries. After extensive agriculture, many of these areas were abandoned, leading to soil erosion, followed by economic losses to the landowners due to encroachment because of sand dunes advancing along the coastlines.

This caused a growing concern for environmental protection, prompting the government to hire Federico Albert, considered the father of natural resources management in Chile, to plan the establishment of exotic species in plantations on degraded soil, aiming to prevent further land loss and to restore the soil. As a result, the first plantations of Blue Gum and Monterey pine were established along coastlines, and besides, the first forest reserves in Chile were created to protect areas of remaining native forest.

In 1931, a legal decree was issued, defining preferred areas for forestry development, and creating a subsidy for implementing intensive timber production. European professionals were also brought in to apply new-at-the-time techniques. As a result, forest exploitation levels increased significantly, and in 1948 the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization declared that if this management continued, the resource would be fully depleted in 107 years. This made people realize the need for more sustainable forestry practices.

In 1960, around 50 years later than Canada, Chile began developing its first professional programs to specialize in forestry. In the following decades, organizations were created to promote forestry research, such as INFOR (The Forestry Institute) and CONAF (The National Forestry Corporation).

After conducting research, some exotic species began to be used for production, including Eucalyptus, Lodgepole pine, Ponderosa pine, Douglas fir, and Acacias. Additionally, in 1970, the government created subsidies up to 75 percent for exotic plantations in deforested areas, which led to an increase of planted areas.

Currently, the forestry industry in Chile is focused on managing exotic species plantations, such as Monterey pine and Eucalyptus, for timber and pulp production. These plantations cover over three million hectares (17.37 percent of the country’s forests).

On the other hand, native forests are primarily used for conservation and recreational purposes. Selective harvesting and thinning enhance the quality of the trees for harvesting, but they only contribute 2.2 percent of the wood production in Chile. Additionally, native forests provide non-wood forest products, though not on an intensive scale.

Alberta’s forest resemblance

In Alberta, 58 percent of land is dominated by Boreal Forest. This ecoregion is one of the most affected by forestry and oil and gas industries, facing significant threats, such as fragmentation, habitat loss, intensified edge effects, and alteration to species’ habitats.

Forestry in Alberta focuses on timber production from native species forests and plantation management, primarily harvesting seven species: white spruce, lodgepole pine, black spruce, balsam fir, aspen, white birch, and balsam poplar.

Both in Chile and Alberta, intensive forestry production typically involves clear-cutting, which has several negative effects, including soil erosion, reduced water infiltration, increased sediment levels in the watersheds, and loss of soil structure. Nevertheless, there are some important differences between the two regions.

Despite the harmful effects of clear-cutting on any ecosystem, Alberta benefits from snow cover during the winter months, and the soil remains frozen for about half of the year, which helps reduce erosion levels during that season. In contrast, this doesn’t occur in most of Chile’s forestry areas. As a result, after clear-cutting, if the area is not treated with barriers or other methods, water runoff will carry sediment into water bodies, leading to an increase in erosion.

In Canada, the Natural Disturbances Model (NDM) is a technique being increasingly used. It’s a harvesting model that aims to replicate the effects of natural disturbances, such as forest fires, to maintain the ecological succession typically caused by lightning-triggered fires in nature.

Harvesting using the NDM technique helps to mirror the cycle of mature forests; it leaves some of the oldest trees to provide shade and moisture for new generations of shade-intolerant trees to grow and continue the cycle. Since plantation rotations are short compared to the centuries-long processes of ecological succession, some aspects need further research to improve this system, such as how to create mixwood forests in short periods, allowing the species that depend on this habitat to thrive.

In Chile, native forests are managed by thinning and pruning, choosing specific individuals to be enhanced by cutting trees around them, reducing competition for resources, which promotes higher wood quality for logging. Additionally, selective harvesting and forest glade harvesting are employed. Selective harvesting involves cutting the best individuals for timber production, though one of the challenges is the potential loss of valuable genetic traits for future individuals of the forest. Forest glade harvesting consists of clearing circular openings in the forest canopy, which allows the regeneration of intolerant species from the current seedling bank.

Biodiversity management

In Canada, forestry is based on native species, which provides a foundation for the fauna species that live in or near the harvesting areas. This requires conservation management plans to maintain the conditions required for each species. This presents a dual challenge: first, understanding the current species and their specific needs, and then being capable of using that knowledge to set boundaries for the logging companies to ensure they respect them.

One example of this is the caribou, a species that requires mature, continuous, and undisturbed forests to thrive. However, due to the lack of regional planning around their habitat, only some disconnected, deteriorated and endangered fragments of their habitat remain, threatening this species’ long-term survival.

In contrast, Chile’s focus on exotic plantations, while allowing some tolerance for wildlife, prevents many species that once inhabited these areas from thriving due to the lack of undergrowth. As a result, there is a challenge in maintaining native forests among exotic plantation areas where animals could live. Although more than 20 percent of Chile is protected in privately managed parks, large areas of exotic plantations, croplands, and human settlements are established where native forest areas once stood. Therefore, many of these protected areas are unconnected, making it necessary to take action to support wildlife.

There are many differences in the focus of forest management between Chile and Alberta, ranging from public protected areas with a native forest timber production in Canada to private protected areas of native forest with exotic plantations in Chile. Each country has its unique context and background, which leads to different approaches.

Neither country has a perfect system, and it is important to acknowledge this, and to continue learning from each other and other sources, and stay informed about developments in other regions. By doing so, we can advocate for the sustainable management of the natural resources with an environmental focus, making decisions that will lead to a positive change across both ends of the continents.