You can judge the character of an industry by the messages it uses to justify its continued existence in the face of clear evidence that it is causing permanent damage to our life support systems. Consider how fossil fuel companies have protected themselves in the face of evidence that they are causing irreparable harm. They simply assert facts that can't be proven or disproven. Likewise, the BC logging industry is making simplistic claims that can't be proven or disproven.

For example, what does it mean by "BC" in "BC will never run out of old growth?"

And what does it mean by "run out of"? What does it mean by "old-growth"? What does it mean by "Truth"?

If by "BC" the billboard means the forest industry, the industry is certainly going to run out of old-growth forest that it can cut, either before all the primary forest that's currently in the timber harvesting land base has been cut, or after it has been cut. The industry is hoping for the latter. Land defenders are aiming for the former. Either way, the industry is going to run out of old-growth forest.

To make such a slippery, bumper-sticker-like statement and assert that it is "Truth" is Orwellian double-speak.

If the industry feels it needs to rely on Orwellian double-speak to justify what it is doing, that's probably a good indicator that efforts will soon be made to run it out of BC.

Forest scientists have determined that a certain minimum percentage of forest in a given bio-geoclimatic variant needs to contain old trees in order to maintain biodiversity. Below that level, there is a danger of biodiversity loss. Biodiversity is an essential characteristic of Earth's life-support systems. That's hard to but on a billboard or a bumper sticker. 

This guy makes forestry facts and figures fun, while clearing up industry and government deception, another NERDY ABOUR NATURE brief video .

A few months back, the BC Government announced new data revealing that there are only 11.1 million hectares of oldgrowth forest remaining in BC, which is a tough figure to visualize and kind of sounds like a lot, right?! Yet when we break down the numbers of the type, size and quality of these varying forest ecosystems, we can easily see that it’s actually not that much compared to the rest of the forestland across the province…so I thought I’d clear it all up here! First off, the term ‘old growth’ here is defined by industry standards of 250yrs old on the coast and 140 yrs old in the interior, so it’s not exclusively primary forest that has never been logged. There are also varying types of old growth forest ranging from high-productivity to low-productivity forest types - LPOG tends to be short, scraggly old trees without a lot of market value or demand for being logged, whereas HPOG is the tall, rich, biodiverse forests made famous here in BC with quality wood that is still being logged right now. New docs from the government have tried to simplify these definitions into not at risk forest (LPOG) and at risk forest (HPOG). Of the remaining 11.1mh of oldgrowth left, only 3.5mh are currently protected, leaving 7.6mh unprotected. 3.6mh of that is considered to be not at risk forest, leaving 5mh of at risk forest, or just over 8% of all the forests in BC. Current deferrals only look at POTENTIALLY sparing 2.6mh of those 5mh for two years while the remaining 2.4mh continue to be logged. Of the highest productivity forest left in BC, much of which still remains unprotected, there is only 400,000 hectares left, or .8% of all the forestland in BC. For perspective, the Canadian government has committed to preserving 30% of biodiversity by 2030 as part of climate action agreements, yet even at this point in time we only have 8% of our healthiest forests remaining, which continue to be cut down as you read this. Many industry-backed organizations have jumped on this 11.1mh figure in an effort to mislead and confuse you in various posts and ad campaigns, but it’s important to remember that this figure is only one cherry picked piece of data, and when we look at the reality of the situation we’re in, we see a different picture than the one they’re trying to paint. So next time you see or hear of someone spouting this nonsense, feel free to drop the real numbers on them, because the sooner we can all acknowledge the reality of the state we’re in, then the more we’ll all be able to act to create a better future for us all, here in the real world. *sources can be found via my website