Category Archives: Forestry

Columbia Basin Trust’s most recent Ecosystem Enhancement Program will provide funding to ten projects that seek to enhance biodiversity and ecosystems throughout the region. CBT will distribute $2.6 million in support to four large-scale projects around the Basin and $316,000 to six smaller scale, shorter-term projects, to prioritize on-the-ground action aimed at improving ecological health and native biodiversity. The Ecosystem Enhancement Program has supported 27 total programs. …Kimberley’s Randy Moody, president of the Whitebark Pine Ecosystem Foundation of Canada (WPEFC) has spent nearly two decades working to preserve and protect the endangered tree species in the Purcell and Rocky mountains.

Suzanne Simard

In her scientific memoir, Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest, forestry researcher Suzanne Simard gracefully intertwines her private and professional lives. As a child, she learned the rough-and-ready ways of her logging ancestors and developed a deep devotion and commitment to forests. As a researcher, she pressed colleagues to look beyond the superficial, above-ground perception that forests are merely collections of individual trees. …For her inspiring and illuminating writing, she will be presented with the Lewis Thomas Prize for Writing about Science at The Rockefeller University on April 17. Named after its first recipient, noted physician-scientist and essayist Lewis Thomas, the prize was established in 1993 by Rockefeller’s Board of Trustees.

VANCOUVER ISLAND — The Strathcona Regional District board has set up a new Natural Resource Committee to help North Island communities make their voices heard. The idea came to the board through chair Mark Baker, who gave a report saying that communities in the North Island have “struggled to resonate with policy makers at both the provincial and federal levels regarding the continual erosion of support for resources-based operations. “Many municipalities have attempted to impress upon governments about the importance of forestry, aquaculture, mining, and other sectors continue to articulate yet their voices continue to go unheard,” he said. …However, director Robyn Mawhinney said… “Natural resources are not what they once were. With fewer resources, our focus should be on gaining more employment through value-added processes, rather than concern for corporate agendas.”

MERRITT, BC — For the fifth week in a row, employees and contractors with Aspen Planers gathered to rally community support for the city’s largest employer, who said this week it still has not received a new cutting permit from the Ministry of Forests. …The mill is already running on just one shift per day. Aspen Planers and mill union leadership say the issue behind the closure is a lack of cutting permits being issued. The Ministry told the Herald that a vast majority of local permits, which are required to harvest logs in B.C., are issued within 45 days, and that it is working to find ways to address First Nations’ concerns around sustainable forestry practices.  “We have little choice but to wait until the provincial government decides that they have completed meaningful consultation with the various Nicola Valley First Nations,” said Bruce Rose.

The B.C. government has been roundly applauded for removing a key word from the provincial regulations governing forest planning. For two decades the word “unduly” has limited the protection of so-called “non-timber” values in B.C. forests. Wildlife habitat, soil, biodiversity and even drinking water could only be protected if it did not “unduly reduce the supply of timber from British Columbia.” …While “unduly” has not been removed from all forestry regulations, this is a clear step forward. Nevertheless, crucial questions remain about the future of forests in B.C. …The province failed to adequately consult with the Indigenous nations impacted by the Private Managed Forest Lands Act. …The vast majority of public submissions to the review highlighted concern over high harvesting rates, fear over water quality and biodiversity loss and the lack of government oversight. Yet, nearly four years on, no policy changes have been proposed.

Idel Dobell

It is said what we don’t know can’t hurt us. I beg to differ… what we don’t know about each other and our forests is not only hurting us but, as our legacy, is going to be devastating for our children and future generations. If we’re going to survive as a species, it’s time to come together to protect the forests we can protect. …For four years, through consultation, we have spelled out, made clear to council our values: We want no more logging of our community forests. Leave all trees in the forests as food, nourishment, habitat – we have already taken too much.

Salmon Arm’s Top 20 program is hosted by Serviss Wealth Management in partnership with Salmon Arm Economic Development Society. This dynamic awards program identifies outstanding entrepreneurs and business professionals across the region. This year, Cam Brown is one of this year’s winners. Cam is a professional forester with 25+ years’ experience in the forestry sector – primarily in consulting roles in western Canada. He manages Forsite’s Resource Management and Technology business unit and has grown it to include offices all across Canada.

Conservation North is applauding the Prince George Natural Resource District for acting on the first recommendation from the Forest Practices Board regarding old growth forests and is now urging the provincial government to follow up on the second one. In a statement issued Wednesday, the Prince George-based conservation group says mapping of old growth within the Prince George Timber Supply Area was completed in December 2022 – as recommended by the FPB following a 2020 investigation of industrial logging of old growth forests in the TSA. The next step, according to the group, is to update a “biodiversity order” to better protect old growth forests.

The B.C. government has scuttled a federal plan to designate large swaths of core critical habitat for the endangered spotted owl, easing the way for imminent old-growth logging, The Narwhal has learned through a freedom of information request. Almost 50 per cent of core critical habitat — habitat that biologists, using the best available science, deemed necessary for the owl’s survival and recovery — was quietly removed from federal maps between 2021 and 2023, following negotiations with the province. On maps published in late January, in a proposed spotted owl recovery strategy, the areas removed from core critical habitat are labelled “potential future critical habitat.” …The BC Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship said “no spotted owl habitat was erased” between 2021 and 2023. However, the ministry did not differentiate between legally defined core critical habitat and newly created “potential future critical habitat.” 

These are both difficult and exciting times to be a forest professional in British Columbia. Societal expectations for B.C.’s forests are changing. How and where timber is harvested is being widely questioned and a large segment of the population wants to halt logging of all old, large trees. The role of Indigenous Peoples in forest management and ownership is rightly expanding. Forests are increasingly used for recreation, while wildfires, bugs, drought, and flooding impact forest health, the environment, and public safety. This weighs heavily on forest professionals. By law, their job is to provide advice for using the forest in a safe, responsible, and sustainable manner. It is also an exciting time for forest professionals because they care about forests; this is their passion, what their education, experience, and training prepared them for. …Forest professionals are part of the solution to ensure B.C.’s forests are here for generations to come.

Midway, B.C.: When Duane, Emily, and Kurtis Vaagen, the family ownership team of Vaagen Fibre Canada (VFC), first shared the news on January 6, 2023, that their family sawmill which has been in operation in the community of Midway for over 10 years, was shutting down indefinitely, the outpouring of support was overwhelming. …The Vaagen family are expressing their appreciation to their many partners for their years of relationship, including employees and contractors, local community members, the Osoyoos Indian Band, West Boundary Community Forest, Interior Lumber Manufacturers’ Association, local area Mayors, Councillors, and Regional District Directors, and local Ministry of Forest staff. “For those of you who called your local MLA or wrote a letter, our collective voices were heard loud and clear, so thank you,” remarked Vaagen. 

For many Canadians, their introduction to clearcut logging came from the Clayoquot Sound protests back in 1993. …While much of the area was spared, clearcutting, instead of more sustainable logging methods, remained the status quo elsewhere in B.C. and old growth forests have continued to fall. …War for the Woods follows a new generation’s campaign against logging that once again has captured the attention of Canadians, including Stephanie Kwetásel’wet Wood, a Sḵwx̱wú7mesh journalist who reports on Indigenous rights and the natural world. …Thirty years after the historic blockades in Clayoquot Sound, Wood travels to Tla-o-qui-aht territory where the protests took place to learn more about the legacy of these actions. …But as communities struggle to balance environmental stewardship with meeting their economic needs, the hurdles to protecting these ancient forests have grown. [Airs Friday, March 17 at 9:00 pm on CBC]

Simon Yu

PRINCE GEORGE — Community forests are an idea that have been implemented throughout the provinces, but Prince George is one community that does not have one. At the recent Future of Forestry forum, the idea of community forests was brought up. …Mayor Simon Yu brought up the idea at the forum and discusses how Prince George first acquired a community forest agreement back in 2006. Back in 2014, city council voted to surrender its forest tenure, and Mayor Shari Green said at the time “in terms of being in the logging business, it’s not our core service.” Mayor Yu says that that the idea of Prince George not having a community forest is bizarre. Mayor Yu says that the idea of a community forest for Prince George does need to be revisited, for the benefits it could provide to the city.

Adjustments to “the extent of harvesting” allowed in the Mount Elphinstone South watershed are recommended in a draft report released March 11 by Polar Geoscience Ltd. Prepared for BC Timber Sales (BCTS), it covers a land expanse in the Roberts Creek, Elphinstone and Gibsons areas. It includes eight stream courses. The values examined included human safety, roads and other public infrastructure, private property developments and water use rights, as well as fish habitat. Polar Geoscience assessed risks posed to those by changes in surface and groundwater flows resulting from forest harvesting. Factors including peak and low water flows, aquifer recharge, sediment, watercourse channel destabilization and the addition of pollutants were analyzed. The report advocates that BCTS “incorporate a degree of conservatism beyond what previous assessments have identified”.

I am speaking for the silent majority who are tired of the media and special interest groups vilifying the forest industry that has supported our hospitals, schools, recreational parks, arenas, and roads for generations of British Columbians, not to mention all of the homes we live in.  The B.C. forest industry and the harvesting of the North Cowichan forest reserve is nothing like the Amazon deforestation, and I blame the media for spreading this misinformation. Our forestry practices, and legal biological regulations are world renowned for ensuring ecologically sustainable management. The media continues to promote a narrative filled with mistruth and not based on renewable forest management. …There is misinformation circulating in North Cowichan that our forest reserve can supply taxpayers with more income from a carbon credit program than the mild harvesting that has occurred since 1946.