Our initiative’s Coordinator, Bill Bourgeois, publishes an new piece titled “Will BCs Forests Deliver – A Forester’s Challenge.” The article is being distributed to all CIF members of the Vancouver Section.

Will BC Forests Deliver Community Needs?

Bill Bourgeois, PhD, RPF
Coordinator
Healthy Forests-Healthy Communities: A conversation on BC forests
August 22, 2011

A wide range of knowledgeable forest leaders are raising the question of whether British Columbia (BC)
forests are on a course that will significantly impact the future of communities and families. As forest
professionals, it is critical we individually or collectively bring forward our views to decision-makers,
communities and concerned citizens. Traditionally foresters, I being one of them, tend to not speak out
for various reasons. However, the time has come to capitalize on the positive reputation of the
profession within the public.

There have been a number of newspaper articles and contributions to the “Healthy Forests- Healthy
Communities: A conversation on BC forests” (https://www.bcforestconversation.com) initiative that have raised
questions regarding the current state of the forest and its future. Many of these include references but
also opinions. I thought it might be useful to bring some of the issues and concerns together where
specific reference materials are available to support the concerns. I would encourage you to review the
following and let decision-makers and concerned citizens know your views, supportive or not, of
whether the current BC forests trajectory will deliver the expected short and long-term community
needs from our forests.

Forest management issues; concerns

• Leadership: No long-term forest lands vision exists to guide policy and management decisions
  in BC; the Government’s “The State of the Forest Report” did not include a vision to evaluate the
  success of existing forest management.
• Re-stocking: Regeneration levels (40-70%) in Mountain Pine Beetle (MPB) impacted areas; this
  level of regeneration is expected to significantly compromise future productivity if not
  corrected, especially with increasing global external influences.
• Monitoring: Staff reductions (25% in 10 years) in BC Forest Service, much in the area of
  monitoring; current levels of oversight are expected to challenge the ability to both adequately
  determine the state of BC forests and ensure sustainable management; no evidence exists that
  other efficiencies or delegation have compensated for the staff reductions.
• Resource inventories: Funding levels of resource inventories (45% of the estimated essential
  staffing levels for inventories maintenance; 75% of the inventories are 25 years old); lack of
  updated and readily available resource inventories is expected to limit managers’ ability to
  evaluate and manage forest conditions appropriately.
• Research: Unprecedented low funding levels for forest lands research (80% over the last 3
  years); reduction of research expenditures is expected to affect the ability of researchers to fill
  knowledge gaps and respond to impacts of global external influences.
• Management: Short-term management policies to assist industry while maintaining forest
  stewardship (e.g., management plans deferred for up to 10 years beyond earlier agreements;
  Government operational decisions focused on reducing industry costs; relaxation of small scale
  regeneration in MPB salvage areas); decisions to focus on short-term competition gains are
  expected to negatively impact the future forest productivity and the forest asset base.
• Policies: Transfer of Community (Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal) interface hazard reduction
  planning and implementation responsibility from Government to communities; increased large-scale
  fire risk exists due to required levels of implementation and funding with all the risk
  residing with communities and not the Provincial Government.
• Industry: Industry focus on marketing at the expense of forest management; failure of the
  forest industry to request Government assistance with long-term forest management costs,
  compared with recent requests for product marketing assistance, suggests forest management
  is not a priority.

Realizing increased value issues; concerns

• Planning: Activity level of public involvement in strategic land and resource planning; public
  involvement limited to providing input into Government plans with limited or no oversight by
  pubic advisory committees to harness past world-class land use planning and threaten global
  land use planning leadership.
• Forest use: Coordination and timber impact limits associated with non-traditional forest
  resources management; reduced lack of policy coordination and the continued legislated limit
  regarding impacts of recreation, road access, fish and wildlife, parks and reserves, cattle
  management and non-timber forest products suggest the focus is on timber management at the
  expense of other resources.
• Product development: Marketing of “value-added products” (10-25% of total Government
  marketing allocation); low levels of market development funding is expected to limit the growth
  of the secondary manufacturing industry and hence community diversification and full
  utilization of the fibre resource.
• Community development: Funding levels ($1 M/year for each Beetle Action Coalition for three
  years) for community diversification in MPB impacted areas; current funding allocations for
  community diversification in each of the three BC regions is expected to limit diversification and
  be far short of the projected funding needed to establish viable and sustainable communities.
• Community diversification: Policy barriers to the encouragement of wood utilization for bioenergy;
  existing barriers limit opportunities for broader diversification and full utilization of the
  forest resource.

Forest environment protection issues; concerns

• Biodiversity: Biodiversity protection initiatives; BC biodiversity “…is vulnerable to rapid
  deterioration, especially in light of climate change,” thereby requiring action to prevent loss of
  species and ecosystems.
• Adaptation: Response to global environmental influences; with a focus primarily on research
  and not operations adaptation is expected to limit future opportunities.
• Productivity: Cumulative impacts; without concerted coordination of broader resource
  management interests (especially in the Northeast) involving oil and gas exploration, forestry,
  mining, hydro development and agriculture, resource management and extraction activities are
  expected to create significant cumulative impacts to ecosystems and forest productivity.
• Restoration: Habitat restoration in areas impacted by the MPB epidemic; current level of
  habitat restoration is expected to significantly reduce ecosystem productivity.
• Watersheds: Impacts of MPB harvesting on streamflows; ecosystem and forest productivity is
  expected to be impacted by rising water tables due to tree harvesting and salvaging in MPB
  harvested watersheds.
• Public involvement: Level of meaningful community participation; local communities and family
  desires regarding forest lands management influence is expected to be limited unless policies
  are changed.

I encourage you, as forest professionals, to let your views be known through direct conversations with
decision-makers, communities or concerned citizens or through the Healthy Forests-Healthy
Communities initiative website, facebook or twitter.

Our initiative responds to Robert Gray’s OpEd piece with a Letter to Editor.

Re: New solutions needed for wildfire woes, Aug. 16

The communities of Kimberly and Cranbrook, with their partners, should be congratulated in coming up with an innovative approach to move towards independence of Provincial Government funding to address their major issue regarding interface area wildfire management. The Government has offloaded the cost and risk of this management to communities. It is only reasonable they encourage and support this type of innovation.

The request by the partnership to modify slightly the boundaries of Crown land adjacent to the two communities is an example of the innovative thinking identified as a challenge arising from the views of BC leaders in forest management (https://www.bcforestconversation.com). With the significant reduction in funding for forest management across the province over the last few years, it is critical to find ways to maintain the forest asset and protect communities through innovative solutions. Government should move immediately to accept the request and make the necessary Crown land map changes. Innovation is critical and flexibility by Government is the least they can do to help communities.

Bill Bourgeois
North Vancouver

The Vancouver Sun has published an OpEd piece by Robert Gray regarding the administrative and fiscal challenges facing communities attempting to deal with wildfire woes. The full article can be found here.

The Williams Lake Tribune publishes a Letter to the Editor drafted by our lead Coordinator, Bill Bourgeois (RPF) outlining the need for a new vision for local forests. The full article can be found here.

The Williams Lake Tribune covers the latest developments from our initiative in its articlePublic input discussed for forestry management.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

A growing concern began in 2009 and continued through 2010 among professional foresters and
biologists, conservationists, academics, community leaders, forest support companies and First Nations
that British Columbia (BC) forests are in need of greater attention to meet societal expectations over the
long-term. During these conversations a number of initiatives were identified, generating the concept
of the Healthy Forests-Healthy Communities: A conversation on BC forests (HFHC) initiative. This was to
be a non-partisan, volunteer-supported initiative to catalyze dialogue with natural resource experts and
local communities (including members of the forestry profession, Aboriginals and non-Aboriginals,
community advocates, conservationists, youth and concerned citizens) to inform decision-makers about
the people’s vision for the forest lands of BC and identify areas for improving long-term sustainable
management to achieve the provincial, community and family goals of ensuring healthy forests and
healthy communities for a brighter BC future. The objectives were to raise the profile of forest
management for development of political party platforms leading up to the next provincial election and
inform decision-makers on communities’ vision for BC forest lands, including local and regional
perspectives and issues.

The process includes three components: 1) securing background information from experts in the field, 2)
holding Community Dialogue Sessions to acquire community views and suggestions, and 3) providing a
website and social media mechanisms to share information and enhance public dialogue. The dialogue
was guided by the following draft forest lands vision which could be modified at regional levels to reflect
local conditions or emphases identified through community discussions:

British Columbia’s forests are managed to:

• ensure the health and protection of all forest values;
• support healthy, diverse and resilient communities; and
• support a sustainable and globally competitive forest products economy.

The Interim Report covers the key findings from the 28 Background Briefs, six (6) Community Dialogue
Sessions and other contributions by concerned citizens. A further 15 Community Dialogue Sessions are
in the planning stages for this fall and further input through the website and social media will be
included in a Final Report expected by December 31, 2011.

More press for our initiative in the Boundary Creek Times outlining some of the challenges facing forestry in the Kootenay-Boundary Region.

The buzz is growing… BC Nature Magazine (Summer Edition) article by Francis Vyse.

The Boundary Creek Tribune also published an article on the Community Dialogue Sessions in Midway and Grand Forks.