
Peter Lister
On May 19, six First Nations and the federal and provincial governments signed a historic agreement to protect a large portion of BC’s Central Coast. …Meanwhile, the Ministry of Forests is moving forward with its Forest Land Planning (FLP) process with seemingly little to no coordination with the [conservation] work being done by the ministry of Water, Land and Natural Resource Stewardship (WLRS). …BC is currently harvesting less than half of its 60 million cubic metre allowable annual cut. The reasons are many and complex but essentially come down to poor prices and tariffs in the key US market, high industry operational costs resulting from a large web of new regulations, and a critical shortage of economically accessible fibre. These factors have resulted in mill closures, job losses, and dramatically reduced government tax revenue, all at a time when the province is facing large budget deficits and record debt.
We need government to take the forest sector crises seriously, and take urgent and decisive action to streamline regulation, reduce crippling industry costs, and provide the fibre supply certainty required to reattract investment in our province. Instead, we have a situation where the forests minister is mandated to increase harvest levels to 45 million cubic meters (with little progress), while our WRLS minister has a mandate to protect an additional 10% of our public land base, even though we already exceed 30×30 targets. This makes no sense and shows a lack of leadership from the premier, who is prioritizing the interests of environmental activists and urban voters over the real economic needs of working British Columbians. Our government’s lack of focus on the economy is driving away business investment, hurting British Columbian’s pocketbooks, and creating a welfare state saddled with debt. This is not a legacy our premier should be proud of.