The Tongass is also the largest National Forest in the United States, covering 16.7 million acres and stretching across mountains, bays, glaciers, 1,000 islands, 18,000 miles of coastline, and almost all of mainland Southeast Alaska. 94% of Southeast Alaska is federally managed lands, and of that, 60% is set aside as Congressionally-designated Wilderness, National Parks, and National Monuments.
The lands and waters of the Tongass sustain a unique Alaskan way of life, including cultural and spiritual ties for Alaska Native communities; subsistence activities; robust salmon fisheries; remote wilderness tourism; and mining, timber, and other economic development activities.
However, forest management in the Tongass National Forest has been a topic of controversy for decades, due in part to the high percentage of public ownership in Southeast Alaska; intense timber extraction in the mid-twentieth century and the economic ramifications of a shrinking industry; and the multiple-use needs of the forest from the tourism, fishing, timber, transportation, and mining sectors, coupled with cultural and traditional uses.
In recent years, collaborative approaches to management have offered opportunities to overcome the seemingly intractable conflict across industries and uses, beginning with the federally chartered Tongass Advisory Committee to develop shared recommendations for a Forest Plan Amendment. This ongoing culture of collaboration on the Tongass has created a range of collaborative land management approaches.
Learn more about some of the recent multi-stakeholder land management efforts: