By the end of 1995 there will be harvesting cutbacks in many areas of British
Columbia.

Reductions in AAC’s coming
union told by head forester

During a break in contract negotia-
tions with British Columbia’s major
employers the IWA-CANADA provin-
cial negotiating committee met with
outgoing Chief Forester to here what
is likely to be on the horizons as far as
annual allowable harvests of timber
are concerned.

The committee met with Cuthbert
on July 22 to hear that in the near
future the annual allowable cut (AAC)
is going to come down in some timber
supply areas across the province.
During the past two years the Ministry
of Forests has been conducting a
review of the AAC in Timber Supply
Areas (TSA) around the province. By
the end of 1995 many decisions will
be made as to whether current rates
of timber harvesting can be main-
tained.

Critics of forest practices have said
over the years that the province can
not sustain the current level of cut
and that there must be a “fall-down”
in timber harvest to come.

Cuthbert told the IWA that the fall-
down is coming quickly as the indus-
try is going to have to make a transi-
tion from old growth to second
growth forests.

In 1976 a Royal Commision on the
Forests warned of the fall-down
effect. In 1979 the Ministry of Forest
planned a TSA review which never
materialized. New AAC’s were set that
year and the industry more or less
operated under assumptions that
could not be backed up with scientific
information.

This year the harvest on provincial
Crown lands is at about 69 million
cubic meters. In addition the industry
is getting about 10 million cubic
meters from private and other sources
including logs that come from private

lands in other provinces.

Cuthbert told the negotiating com-
mittee that the industry has used
about half of the old-growth forests in
the province and that it has to dis-

perse its harvests over the rest of the
forest land base.

He said the long-term picture
depends on how we manage the
forests and that intensive silviculture
practices are needed to capture
growth. In the short term the industry
can improve utilization of the timber
species that are out there. Cuthbert
said that “innovation and change will
allow us to capture extra volume.”

He said that the timber growing
capacity for the province has an aver-
age mean of 2.5 cubic meters per
hectare and that there are some sites
that can grow between 10-15 cubic
meters per year.

In negotiations with the forest
industry the IWA has heard industry
say that it believes that the AAC is
coming down to the 55 million cubic
meter range. Cuthbert said that sce-
nario assumes no innovation and
change on the industry’s part.

The Chief Forester said that the
upcoming Forest Practices Code and
its new harvesting regulations, such
as limiting the size of clearcuts, will
have a definite downward effect on
the AAC. Such changes are needed to
satify the public’s concerns, he said.

In reference to the Forest Renewal
B.C. plan. announced by the govern-
ment in April of this year, Cuthbert
said the current TSA review will pro-
vide valuable information as to where
the Mininstry can place its priorities
for forest renewal.

He said that the Forest Renewal
Plan is a long-term committment to
growing quality second growth
forests. He added that our forest can’t
compete with countries such as
Brazil, Chile or New Zealand for vol-
ume of regrowth but that our forests
can be of better quality and higher
value. That means long rotations
between harvest to ensure quality
wood.

But Cuthbert said that there are a
lot of sites here that don’t regrow

trees and that often there is a poor job
done in managing second crops.

Annoucements on the annual allow-
able cuts are forthcoming as the TSA
review fulfills its mandate. Cuthbert
says that TSA units in the province's
central interior are looking better that
in other areas of the province, espe-
cially the coastal TSA’s such as north-
ern Vancouver Island and Kincome
Inlet. 2

In the interior many of sawmills are
maintaining their cut by processing

rivate wood and Cuthbert says that
ne can’t see that continuing i

nately.

In the Cariboo region some saw-
mills are going to come to the end ofa
period where they have been cutting
pine infected by the mountain pine
beetle. In the Williams Lake TSA the
normal AAC is 2.5 million cubic
meters. Due to the bug kill cut it has
been elevated to 4 million in years

past.

° Traditional jobs in the logging industry will be fewer in the years ahead.

Almost $100 million targeted
for training in future forests

Training for B.C forest sector
workers has moved into centre stage
as a result of the provincial govern-
ment’s recently announced Forest Re-
newal BC plan. Over the next five
years, the plan proposes that a new
crown corporation, called Forest Re-
newal B.C., direct re-investment of ap-
proximately $2 billion in new
stumpage fees into five priority areas
of forest sector activity. Training has
been short-listed as one of those pri-
ority areas.

Preliminary estimates indicate that.
close to $100 million per year of the
Forest Renewal budget will be target-
ed at forest sector worker training ini-
tiatives. In background documents
that describe details of the new
provincial plan, the government is
proposing to establish a Forest Sector
Skills Council to manage all aspects of
sector training.

The concept of a sector skills coun-
cil for forest sector workers was first
put forward at an IWA provincial con-
ference on training held in November,
1993. During the two-day event, B.C.
local union delegates considered the
merits of a sector council similar to
initiatives in the Canadian steel and
auto parts industry. In those indus-
tries, unions and employers bi-partite,
labour-management organizations
which control the co-ordination and
promotion of training in their sector.

Because the Forest Renewal plan
will also create employment in the
areas of intensive forest land manage-
ment and forest land rehabilitation,
the sector council is also capable of
handling some of the job tracking and
adjustment measuresthat will be re-
quired as the new work opportunities
are identified. With an effective
labour-management structure, the
Council can ensure that the current
workforce is properly protected as
changes occur in the industry.

Decisions on how the Council is
structured and when it will become
operational will be made in late June
by the Forest Sector Strategy Commit-
tee, which has played an important
role in the design and launch of the
Forest Renewal program. In a prelimi-
nary report prepared for the Strategy
Committee by one of its working
groups, the proposed working struc-
ture of the Council includes a bi-par-
tite, labour-management Board of

Directors as well as a co-managed ad-
ministrative structure.

One of the early challenges of the
Council will be mapping out a work-
able training agenda for the sector. An
obvious first step in that agenda
would be the co-ordination and
expansion of various local training ini-
tiatives that have already developed
training programs in their area. Local
programs such as the Northern Interi-
or Forest Industry Training Initiative,
the Southern Interior Training Com-
mittee, the South Island Forest Work-
er Training Project, and the Fraser
Training Society are all examples of
locally based training programs in
which the IWA has a significant
degree of input and control.

Another important priority for the
Council should be the design and de-
livery of the training that will be re-
quired as a result of the province’s
new Forest Practices Code. Legisla-
tion covering the new code is expect-
ed to be in place by the fall of 1994
with full implementation expected by
January 1, 1995. Government esti-
mates target the number of people
who will require some form of train-
ing as a result of the new code at over
40,000. How much training will be re-
quired to fully comply with the new
code, how that training should be
structured and delivered are all im-
portant questions that a new Council
will have to tackle head-on if it hopes
to have a relevant program in place
within the timeframe mandated by
legislation. As well, given the de-
mands that are being made of the log-
ging sub-sector in terms of
enviromental performance, new
havesting systems and an expanded
“stewardship” mandate, it is clear that
there will be a need for logging crews
to continuously up-date themselves
on a wide array of logging and
forestry issues.

Although there is no similar legisla-
tive pressure in place, the manufac-
turing side of the industry faces
similar kinds of issues that will re-
quire a broadly based, more continu-
ous, on-going training effect in that
sub-sector. There the demands are
coming from markets, where quality
and value issues are critical, and from
technology, where process changes
are constantly moving forward.

- Phillip Legg, Assistant
Research Director

—SSS SSS

2/LUMBERWORKER/AUGUST, 1994