IKEA buys 11,000 acres of U.S. forest to keep it from being developed
It&#x27;s none of my business if Ikea wants to buy productive forest land and take it out of production.<p>However, I don&#x27;t understand how it is any kind of signal of virtue.<p>Would it be virtuous to buy productive farm land and take it out of circulation?<p>How is forest land any different?<p>In a previous life, it would be broadly correct to say that I worked in the forest industry.  My body still hurts when I think about it.<p>I worked for wood lot owners, felling trees, trimming off the branches, sectioning the logs, splitting the wood and then stacking it to be sold by the cord.  These woodlots had been in operation for over 150 years.  Same land, different trees.  They still operate now.<p>I also worked as a tree planter, hired by small contractors working for &#x27;big forest&#x27;.  Us tree planters went in after the heavy equipment had ripped out the trees, tearing the land to shreds in the process.  It felt like what ground would have been like after a B-52 strike, an eerie hell scape, but with an explosion of small plants and flowers with new access to the sun, deer and other wildlife roaming free, wondering at the strange human interloper.  Sometimes wolves and bears, at which point it felt rather lonely, me with a Swiss Army knife (mostly for the fork) and my nearest crew mate being well outside shouting distance.<p>The churned up land we were planting had been pulp forest itself for over a hundred years.  As I planted, others were taking soil and water samples.  To the forest company, the forest was a long term asset and that it thrived was in their interest.<p>I didn&#x27;t think about it much then, but others long dead had planted that ground before me.  Those foot long trees I planted have long been harvested and new trees planted in their place.<p>Trees are like wheat, or corn, or quinoa.  Except instead of being a once a year crop, trees are once every twenty five years or so.<p>Otherwise, what&#x27;s the difference?