MONTRÉAL — Today, the Honourable Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Environment and Climate Change, announced up to $7.5 million in funding over the next five years through the Habitat Stewardship Program for Species at Risk. This funding will support 56 conservation projects across Canada, led by communities, individuals, and non-government organizations taking action to recover species at risk in their communities. The Habitat Stewardship Program for Species at Risk plays an important role in the implementation of the Species at Risk Act through the conservation of land-based species at risk. In Quebec, 12 projects will receive up to $1.5 million.
People in British Columbia are invited to share feedback on a proposal to add a new Special Forest Management Area (SFMA) supporting regenerative forestry and conservation in the Great Bear Rainforest. The proposed area consists of 7,865 hectares of forested land that would transition from commercial harvesting to being prioritized for conservation and regenerative forestry. The SFMA designation is specific to the Great Bear Rainforest and restricts commercial forestry operations. If approved, this area will be the ninth SFMA within the Great Bear Rainforest. Public comment will be accepted until April 5, 2024, and will allow the Province and Kwiakah First Nation to consider public input into decisions and implementation. It will also provide insight into how the land is being used by the public. The Province is working with Kwiakah First Nation, which seeks an active role in the long-term management of the area. 
The BCCFA 2024 Conference & AGM will take place in Mackenzie, BC on June 11 – 13. Registration will open March 18, sponsorship opportunities are available now. 
For a generation now, governments have played a dangerous, costly game with wildfire in British Columbia. Government must do many things to win this game. It must prevent wildfire outbreaks, put fires out and help communities recover from the aftermath. …Wildfires are now more frequent, intense and costly. But how we manage wildfire also shapes this new reality. …B.C.’s February budget set aside $233 million for wildfire management. No B.C. government has ever made a larger initial commitment to fighting wildfires. …But will it be enough? Over the last 10 years, the average annual wildfire-fighting bill has been $498 million, more than twice the amount laid out in the government budget. Contrary to this commitment, the premier warned he’s expecting this fire season to be even worse than the $1.1-billion 2023 season. …In addition to developing more efficient and effective partnerships to respond to wildfires, we must finally recognize and substantially fund prevention and mitigation measures.
The forests of the Pacific Northwest, sometimes soaked in feet of rainfall each year, are known for growing some of the largest trees in the world. Together, they store thousands of tons of carbon in their trunks and support hundreds of critters. But even these lush forests can be affected by climate change. If the world continues to emit greenhouse gases at its current pace, the North Cascades, Olympic Mountains, Puget Sound lowlands and Western Oregon Cascades could see at least twice as much fire activity in the 30 years following 2035, according to new research led by Alex Dye, a faculty research associate in the Oregon State University College of Forestry. Fire seasons — the dry and hot months — are expected to get longer, in some places spanning from early spring to late fall. …The new research aims to better describe how climate change is impacting a region where fire was historically infrequent, west of the Cascade crest.
More than $8 million will be used to plant trees in communities across Washington as the Washington State Department of Natural Resources announced the 45 recipients of the agency’s largest Urban and Community Forestry Grant Program ever. The record-shattering dollar amount is 14 times bigger than the previous single-year record of $550,000 and is nearly three times the total grants awarded by the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) for urban and community forestry projects since 2008. “Access to clean air, shade, and green spaces should be a basic human right, but the fact is that throughout our state, lower-income communities and communities of color more often live in neighborhoods with more concrete and asphalt, and too few trees,” said Commissioner of Public Lands Hilary Franz. “We need to bring the same urgency we brought to our wildfire crisis to our efforts to ensure everyone lives in neighborhoods with adequate tree canopy.”
MACAU
A group of organizations, including the Forest Stewardship Council, Preferred by Nature, the Roundtable on Sustainable Biomaterials, and the Sustainable Biomass Program, are joining forces as the Risk Information Alliance (RIA). Increasing regulatory requirements such as the EU Regulation on Deforestation-free Products (EUDR) and market pressure for responsibly produced products are posing a serious challenge to businesses, certification schemes and producers in agricultural and forest-based sectors. The RIA will develop and maintain credible risk assessments with a range of partners and across commodities offering value beyond the EUDR. Through an innovative and collaborative approach, the Alliance will encourage risk data sharing in a pre-competitive sphere and cut through the complex and costly landscape facing companies and sustainability systems. …“This alliance will create a common language, making sure that businesses, authorities and stakeholders in forestry and agriculture are working effectively towards the same goal,” said Kim Carstensen, FSC Director General.
Thank you for your letter dated 7th November 2024 and the subsequent email exchanges. …We were already in the process of planning a corporate group review when we received your complaint. …We do not consider the complaint to fall in scope of a case that has to be managed according to the procedure for Processing Policy for Association (PfA) Complaints (FSC-PRO-01-009). …FSC will proceed with the corporate group review as planned. We have agreed the terms with Paper Excellence and the contracting of a third-party law firm is at an advanced stage. We expect to see the results within two months and plan to publish a statement about the results thereafter. We cannot share the terms of reference and it will not be possible to have additional observers in the investigation. Nevertheless, we certainly aim to explain the rationale of any decision that may be taken. [see more in 
A report has called on ministers to scrap the huge subsidies and tax breaks given to conifer forests because they do too little to combat the climate crisis. The report from the Royal Society of Edinburgh said the tens of millions of pounds in subsidies given to the timber industry should instead be spent on longer-living native forests, which have greater and clearer climate and biodiversity benefits. It said the Scottish and UK governments are wrong to argue that public subsidies are needed to help plant more, larger conifer forests. These plantations are largely monocultures using a single species that have a relatively short lifespan. Instead, public subsidies should be diverted to planting millions of native broadleaf trees, including in urban areas, which capture and keep more CO2, support more plant and animal species, store more carbon in the soil, and have a far longer lifespan.
