Koalas evolved alongside eucalyptus forests, able to digest the usually-toxic leaves with assistance from symbiotic bacterial buddies. But the forests they’ve lived with for thirty million years suffer from modern human stressors, first among them, unsustainable logging to clear the way for urban development or more profitable plantations. The toxin of TODAY creates challenges koalas need our help to digest. The 2020 bushfire season fueled by prolonged drought and the driest month on record devastated wild eucalypt forests and koala populations that had never recovered from heavy hunting for their fur almost a century earlier. The species was officially declared endangered (nearing extinction) in 2022.
As their wild habitat disappears into unconnected fragments, fast growing blue gum tree plantations for paper pulp attracts large numbers of koalas, who suffer again when the trees are harvested. In the Australian state of Victoria, native forest logging was banned last year, but world-wide, fans of this small creature endemic to a country not our own also have ways to participate in potential progress. Especially writers—and readers. Readers as a group wield tremendous influence on the publishing industry, and we (cuz yeah, writers must be readers as well) can speak up for planetary best practices.
Sustainability initiatives over the years have created a plethora of technological options, so pressuring our publishers to choose them, and supporting those presses with strong practices are the roles we can take on. This needn’t be an individualistic drop-in-da-bucket effort; informed planetary citizens en masse can assure publishing leaders that sustainability efforts create a long-term return on investment. Deforestation for all reasons combined creates about 10% of worldwide carbon emissions, whereas living forests capture carbon, providing valuable partnership in our efforts to lessen climate chaos. Around 70 million trees felled annually for paper production means habitat destruction for a huge variety of animal life. Researching this post, I checked with university presses, since universities often have sustainability plans. But finding answers even there is hard. No matter how uncomfortable, we can ask the question, over and over, wherever we buy books or sell our writing, what actions different publishers are taking to protect our mutual future.
Whether your attention is caught by the multi-generational migration of monarch butterflies, the nighttime song of whippoorwills, or the bright eyes and tufted ears of koalas, they are speaking to us—and they need us to speak up for them. The good news is: We Can!
