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The Chief Forester delivered some very sobering news in Kelowna at the end of October. He laid out the scenario forecasting Central Interior wood supply for the period from ten to roughly fifty years from now. Depending on the assumptions in the Annual Allowable Cut (AAC) calculations, fibre supply to the local mills from Prince George to Kamloops could drop anywhere from 19 to 29 percent measured against long term cut levels. In fact, the actual drop is much more severe than that.

Going back several years, the AAC was raised to try and combat the pine beetle epidemic. For example, the AAC in the Central Interior has been raised from long term sustainable levels of 23 million cubic metres per year to 30 million metres per year over the last decade. The "middle of the road" analysis provided by the Chief Forester predicts cut levels to drop to 18.7 million cubic metres 10 to 15 years from now. This represents a drop in AAC levels of over 40 percent from today's level of cut, drastically affecting employment and economic stability in the forest industry.

While this is bleak news indeed, a look at the other side of the story uncovers not just the risks but also the opportunities in the possible responses we adopt to this changing context for interior communities.

The risks here are indeed high. Local economies are in danger, both from the forest and tourism industry perspective as the forest land base they rely on changes in scope and character. Public recreation, biodiversity, ecosystem services and forest composition will change dramatically, threatening our social and psychological environment.

In the face of this reality we must be very careful how we move forward. Fortunately, we have a structure already built to house upcoming discussions - a structure that the government in its New Era Promises pledged to support. This house is the collection of agreed-to land use plans we already have in place in the interior. From this perspective the beginning of the transition we face is to stay the course on certain issues.

We have spent long years reaching hard-won agreement between the forest industry, the tourism industry, the environmental community and local and provincial governments regarding the big picture certainty in the strategic allocation of land use. This big picture view is long term, describing the hundred-year view of the capability of the land base to produce certain opportunities for the various partners in society to utilize. Growing site capability, steep mountain viewscapes, riparian areas, proximity to mills - in short, all the basic characteristics of the land base remain the drivers in the potential economic use of the forested land base.

The beetle epidemic will pass. What will the legacy of uplifted AACs be? In effect we are cutting tomorrow's trees today. How do we pass this benefit along to our children to address longer term sustainability? Perhaps a trust fund where AAC uplift stumpage is placed for the development of other economic streams in the interior. This would be analogous to the fund Alberta designed to stabilize the ups and downs of oil revenues in that province.

We can also create a legacy by ensuring that we do not damage future options with non-strategic actions in the short term. For example, our province has a world class brand built around Super Natural B.C. Our protected areas system is key to that brand and we have shown leadership in the creation and protection of our park system. Markets are volatile enough with global over-supply, tariff impositions, challenges to the quality of beetle killed wood and those seeking to decrease our market share by whatever means possible.

Add to these problems additional considerations such as green markets, certification, investment, the upcoming Olympics and World Heritage Site designations. In this context we do not need to put the B.C. Interior forest industry at risk in these markets by trying to redraw the land use plan lines or by ignoring science and strategic assessment regarding how we cope with the current epidemic. We must stay the course on this issue, refuse the temptation to log everywhere, especially in the protected area system, and plan the most effective forestry activity over the next decade.

The established land-use planning framework will guide this discussion. In timber priority areas, the beetle epidemic may have altered the strategies used in current practice to achieve the objectives for the zone. It may be the case that we need to revisit things like Old Growth Management plans and placement, size of riparian areas and the proposed level of access creation in parts of the land base.

In the end, it is precisely because we cannot stop the beetle or log all of the trees it has and will kill that we have an opportunity to enhance other values. This will give us more economic and social options by being very mindful of where we harvest timber and how we do it. The tools of communication, strategic allocation and long cooperation are at hand. The challenge is to use them in new creative ways to cope with the current situation while not foreclosing future options.

- Dave Neads

More articles in the series, The Other Side of The Story

Cariboo Chilcotin Conservation Society
Unit 201, 197 2nd Ave North Williams Lake, B.C., V2G 1Z5
Phone/Fax: 250 398-7929 • ccentre@ccconserv.org • Coordinator: Marg Evans

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