Since 1988, the forest industry has contracted radically. The pulp mills that once stood in Prince Rupert, Kitimat, Ocean Falls, Port Alice, Campbell River, Gold River, Tahsis and Woodfibre are long since gone. Since 2000, more than 80 sawmills provincewide have been shuttered. Mining, not forest products, is now B.C.’s largest export sector. Rural British Columbians have dealt with, and adapted to, massive job losses in the forest sector over the last three decades. Since 2000, more than 45,000 jobs have been lost. The industry’s once-proud claim that forestry paid for healthcare and education is now illusory. Government revenue reporting shows that forestry does not pay its own bills never mind underpinning social service expenditures. Forestry is now a mere three per cent of provincial gross domestic product.