They know that the demand for wood products will not abate and contrived shortages increase profits. In the meantime, the guys down in marketing are finding other ways to capitalize on environmentalist propaganda. The timber industry is now promoting something called sustainable forestry, whatever that means. None of this analysis is meant to disparage the timber industry. The exact same thing is happening in mining, oil and gas, you name it.
American industry has an absolute genius for turning lemons into lemonade.
But remember this the next time you see Al Gore shedding crocodile tears about how urban sprawl is taking valuable real estate from small farmers. Because the very next day, Gore will be introducing a clean water initiative aimed at farm run-off or a new ban on pesticides. When these increased costs of doing business hit struggling small farmers, those farmers are history. The big corporate farms will endure, but for the small fry it's goodbye amber waves of grain, hello Ranchette Estates. Every time the environmental bar is raised in an industry, the smaller operators get squeezed out.