BC has legislative and policy instruments directed to providing the public with information on the management of Crown forests to meet identified objectives. There are three (3) main questions relative to strategic decision-making that contribute to building trust in BC forest stewardship, and moving to providing the desired “social license,” specifically:

1) Is the public aware of proposed plans and activities?
2) Are the public expectations being met through implementation of plans and activities?
3) Is there adequate compliance and enforcement?

Unfortunately, the current instruments do not lend themselves to getting to “yes” on these questions. Building community and public confidence in forest manager decision-making would benefit from the nesting of instruments associated with answering each of these questions, as summarized in https://www.bcforestconversation.com/building-confidence-forest-management-integrated-approach/. Government and industry would benefit from adopting a modified version of a previously proposed Community Engagement Framework to address inadequate public consultation.