Forest Service spokesman Joe Walsh said figures from more recent years were being processed, but did not know when they would be available. Earnings turned to losses, however, as logging collapsed in the Northwest due to wildlife protections. Federal harvests nationally fell from about 4.8 billion board feet to 1.2 billion board feet over the same period. The slump in the current market price of lumber will make it even harder for federal logging to turn a profit, especially as it increasingly focuses on thinning smaller trees of more marginal value to reduce the danger of wildfires throughout the West. Only timber sales in the eastern and southern states, where trees generally grow thicker and faster than in the West, did not lose money.
Federal officials concede logging in national forests costs taxpayers.
But they say it more than pays for itself in terms of better forest health, reduced danger of wildfires, improved wildlife habitat, local jobs and other benefits. Indeed, they say the federal timber program should no longer be judged on how many dollars or board feet of timber it produces, but on the improved conditions it leaves behind. And they say they are designing new accounting methods to reflect that. Watchdog groups such as Oppenheimer's agree that continued stewardship logging may be necessary, especially to reduce fire hazards in overcrowded forests. But they say the Forest Service too often plans such logging around the most valuable timber, not the timber that most needs it.