“Alaska’s untold secret” — the dividends paid by Southeast Alaska’s “Seabank”
A hiker looks out over forests, mountains, and ocean channels that comprise
part of the Tongass National Forest, or SeaBank, in Southeast Alaska. Photo by Howie Garber.
Wild salmon. Clean water. Clean air. Carbon storage. Climate change mitigation. Tourism,
commercial fisheries — and billions of dollars in economic benefit.
Since 2018, the Alaska Sustainability Fisheries Trust (ASFT) has quietly published reports that
upend managers’ historical ways of thinking about Southeast Alaska and the Tongass National
Forest — and redefine priorities for management now and in the future. ASFT’s annual
“SeaBank” report outlines and quantifies the benefits flowing from Southeast Alaska’ trees,
estuaries, creeks, lakes, rivers, coasts, ocean and more. These benefits include goods and services
that annually “renew,” provided that the natural capital on which they depend is never
“overdrawn.”
A deer rests in the alpine of the Tongass National Forest, on Admiralty Island. Photo by Mary Catharine Martin.
In the language of the SeaBank, Southeast Alaska’s natural capital produces economic outputs
from the seafood and visitor products industries worth several billion dollars a year to Southeast
Alaska residents, non-resident workers, visitors and society as a whole. Ecosystem services
provide this stream of income as natural capital. It’s a complex interplay of plant and animal
communities and their environment that interact as one functional unit – SeaBank.
“The 2020 SeaBank report underscores that Southeast Alaska is one of the most productive
ecosystems in the world,” said Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust founder and Sitka-based
commercial fisherman Linda Behnken. “Southeast Alaska’s natural capital produces economic
outputs worth several billion dollars a year, every year, to Southeast residents, visitors and
society as a whole. This coastal ecosystem is also incredibly vulnerable to a rapidly warming
climate and industrial activities that diminish the productivity of the underlying natural capital.”
ASFT released its 2020 SeaBank report at the end of last year. While the 129-page report
contains a treasure trove of information to anyone looking to ensure the long-term profitability of
the region, some key findings are:
SeaBank’s annual “fish dividend” makes Southeast Alaska, along with Bristol Bay, one
of two top ecosystems for commercial salmon production.SeaBank’s scenery, fish and wildlife and remote recreation opportunities are assets that
attract over 1.5 million visitors each year – two- thirds of all visitors to Alaska and more
than any other region in the state.Coastal areas such as Southeast Alaska are the most economically productive ecosystems
in the world – not only for coastal communities, but also for national economies and
global trade. Coastal systems comprise only 8 percent of the planet’s surface but generate
43 percent of the global ecosystem service economic value.The Tongass National Forest, which is the heart and lungs of the Southeast SeaBank,
sequesters 44 percent of all carbon sequestered in U.S. national forests.Southeast Alaska has one of the largest estuary systems in the world. Estuaries provide
erosion control, help purify water, are breeding grounds for a variety of animals, and are
nurseries for salmon, forage fish, and shellfish. Three-fourths of all fish caught in
Southeast Alaska use its estuaries during some part of their life history — including
salmon, halibut, sablefish and rockfish.Estuaries are at extreme risk from climate change — especially seagrass meadows and
kelp forests.Extreme weather events such as record heat, intense snow and rain associated with
atmospheric rivers, marine heat waves, snow droughts (when rain falls instead of snow),
and other anomalous weather events will increase.Southeast Alaska has already warmed by 3° Fahrenheit over the last half century; average
temperatures could rise by another 3° to 5° F by 2050. Southeast Alaska may experience
the largest change in number of winter days above freezing in all North America.Ocean waters are getting more acidic. That makes it harder for crabs, crustaceans, krill,
pteropods and other species to build and maintain their shells. Their populations will
decline, which will impact animals that feed on them, like salmon.Together, industrial logging and climate change are “double jeopardy for salmon.”
Forests help keep streams the right temperature and keep water quality high. Industrial
logging, however, has “harmed salmon habitat in some of Southeast Alaska’s most highly
productive watersheds.” Failed culverts from logging roads have also eliminated hundreds
of miles of salmon habitat for fish, leading to “millions of dollars in losses to Southeast
Alaska’s fishermen.”Industrial logging has cut “nearly one third of the crucial, most valuable large-tree old-
growth forest stands,” with ramifications for ecosystem integrity, tourism, hunting and
more.
An Uncruise Adventures cruise ship, with a fleet of kayaks in the water behind it, in the Tongass National Forest. Uncruise, a boutique local cruise ship operator, has been vocal about the importance of the intact Tongass National Forest, or SeaBank, to its business. Photo by Ben Hamilton.
The Forest Service is taking comments until January 24 on its proposed plan to restore Roadless
protections to the Tongass National Forest — and on the wider scale, the U.S. Department of
Agriculture in July 2021 announced its plan for what it calls the Southeast Alaska Sustainability
Strategy, or SASS, which prioritizes sustainable, community-led, culturally-important uses of the
Tongass, and which eliminates industrial-scale logging of old growth. That’s all relevant to the
report Behnken and the team at ASFT have been publishing for three years now.
A male brown bear follows a female brown bear in a Southeast Alaska estuary during mating season in 2016. Southeast Alaska has one of the largest estuary systems in the world. Estuaries are particularly productive, according to the most recent annual SeaBank report — as a breeding ground for animals, as a place ¾ of all fish caught in Southeast use in some part of their life cycle, and more. Estuaries are also at extreme risk from climate change. Photo by Mary Catharine Martin
“As our region weighs resource management decisions and develops adaptation strategies for
climate change, we think it is critical that stakeholders and policy makers factor in the true value
of SeaBank’s goods and ecosystem services so that we make informed long-term decisions that
address climate change, protect Southeast Alaska’s natural capital, and ensure more sustainable
coastal economies,” Behnken said.
A king salmon on a line in Southeast Alaska gets pulled toward the net. The 2020 SeaBank report calls industrial logging and climate change “double jeopardy for salmon.” Photo by Bjorn Dihle.