U.S. agriculture secretary calls for more forest conservation

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said the country needs to spend more resources managing and protecting its forests in remarks he gave in a speech last week in Seattle.

Vilsack said that protecting the forest has a number of environmental and economic benefits, including creating jobs, combating climate change, and conserving water. Climate change has largely been cited as a reason for the increase of in the number of catastrophic wild fires seen in the western half of the U.S. And, as more forests are destroyed, climate change only gets worse in a seemingly endless cycle.

Vilsack's plan calls for the government to create green jobs that restore forests, so the forests can be used as "carbon sinks" to lessen the impact emissions have on global warming.

For more info on what Vilsack had to say, check out this story from The Boston Globe.