wa

|

“FOREST AND ENVIRONMENT

B.C. Liberals: Don’t give away the tree farm

IWA MEMBERS IN B.C. need to be watching
closely as the Liberals get set to make forest policy
reforms. Last December, the British Columbia gov-
ernment tabled a proposal in softwood lumber dis-
cussions with the United States that would see the

POLICY PERSPECTIVES
BY SCOTT LUNNY

province making a massive overhaul of the Forest
Act. The Forest Actis the legislation governing the
BC forest industry, dealing with everything from
tenure (harvesting rights on Crown-owned land)
and stumpage (the fee for that right) to the process
companies must engage in when they sell/transfer
their tenure or close a sawmill.

Arguably, the Act is out-dated — the last major
overhaul was the product of a Royal Commission
in 1976. It is also argued that, notwithstanding
pure “free market” zeal on behalf of the provincial
Liberal government, change is needed. Many of the
policy instruments in the Act are no longer achiey-
ing their intended purpose.

One example is appurtenancy. No government
has ever fully engaged the provisions of the Forest
Act allowing for harvesting rights to be revoked
where a company fails to maintain production
facilities. The U.S. claims appurtenancy distorts
the marketplace forcing Canadian producers to
maintain uneconomic mills and, as a result, flood
the marketplace with Canadian lumber. The indus-

try claims it limits their ability to attract capital
investment.

In reality, however, appurtenancy and other

such provisions in the Act have benefited workers
and communities. The “tenure hammer” is used to
force discussions with stakeholders, providing the
opportunity for the union and communities to
maintain jobs and economic activity in a region
where a company is closing a mill. The renewal of
the Evans Forest Products mill in Golden through
such a process in the mid-1990s is a shining exam-
ple of what can be achieved. That mill is now
owned and operated profitably by Louisiana
Pacific.
So the question to our provincial government is, if
change is necessary, can it be done in a way to leave the
door open for that kind of opportunity? Or is the gov-
ernment simply going to let companies run roughshod
over B.C. communities and IWA members?

Our union supports change where change is need-
ed. The new, results-based Forest Practices Code has
the support of our union with a very important caveat
— enforcement must be maintained and penalties for
non-compliance must be severe. Similarly, the IWA
is taking a principled rather than ideological stand on
forest policy. We support change, but that change
must be in the best interests of the people of the
province — the owners of the land - who rightly
demand not only good economic value from the for-
est, but also good social value.

IWA President Dave Haggard held a series of
“town hall” meetings earlier this year to discuss
forest policy (reports of these meetings are avail-

able on the IWA website at www.iwa.ca). IWA
members, community and industry leaders and
concerned citizens told him they are concerned
social objectives are being sacrificed for the eco-
nomic benefit of forest companies. They don’t
want a “free market” policy that ends up turning
vibrant resource communities throughout the
province into ghost towns.

Some provincial legislators attended the town
hall meetings. The union subsequently met with
Forest Minister Mike de Jong (who attended the
town hall in Duncan) and he knows well our con-
cerns. But the proof of the pudding will come with
the eating. And it is not certain that workers and
communities will be able to swallow what the
provincial government is planning to offer up in
the spring. IWA members need to ensure that our
concerns have been heard. If they are not, we need
to ensure that MLA’s in our communities pay a
political price for ignoring their constituents.

The IWA position is simple we can and do sup-
port change if that change is meaningful and
reflects the results that the peoplé of this province
expect from the harvest of their timber. The results
must reflect tenure stability, not the instability of
timber auctions. Those results may be achieived by
market reforms, but not at the expense of stable
jobs and vibrant rural communities. There is room
for more flexibility to get the right logs to the right
mill, but the province cannot give up its responsi-
bility to hold timber harvesters accountable to
achieve both economic and social objectives.

Scott Lunny is the IWA’s Director of Policy and Information Services

& Vast regions and areas of lodgepole pine are being consumed by pine beetles, threatening future timber harvests.

Central Westcoast Forest
Society wins Enviro award
Back in September the Ucluelet-
based Central Westcost Forest
Society was honoured to receive
one of the B.C. Minister of Water,
Land and Air
Protection’s 2002
Environmental
Awards. The
CWFS, which is
an IWA-certified
two man opera-
tion was repre-

igaeek

It’s time to meet the beetles!

Interior sawmills get ready to catch-up with infestation

and Warren Wartig sented by Local 1-

85 member Len
Dziama. It was chosen for its more
than seven years of restoration work
in the westcoast rainforest.

Brother Dziama said the award
was a tribute to the society's stake-
holders, which include the districts
of Ucluelet, Tofino and Alberni-

THE MOUNTAIN PINE beetle epi-
demic in the B.C. Interior has
already covered over 8 million
hectares of forest lands and an esti-
mated 72 million cubic meters of
lodgepole pine.

There are some estimates that,
given another mild winter, the dam-
age could spread to over 160 million
cubic meters of wood by next year.
The bug kill area now covers over
i100 km. north to south and has
widths exceeding 450 km. It stretch-
es from Cache Creek through the
Valemount and McBride areas,
through Tweedsmuir Park, Williams
Lake, over to Vanderhoof and on up
to Fort St. James.

Local 1-424 president Fred Carroll
says several sawmills in the local
union will be ramping up over the
rest of the year and will be mixing
bug kill wood into the production
flow. “It’s something that we have to

get a handle on,” says Brother
Carroll. “There is too much at stake,
in terms of the health of future
forests and lost economic opportun-
ties, to delay any further.” Most of
the damaged forests are in the local’s
geographical jurisdiction.

The province has called for $120
million in federal assistance over 5
years to help selectively harvest
stands to stop the spread of the bee-
tles. It has received federal commit-
ments for about $40 million.

Local 1-425 president Wade Fisher
reports that “there is lots” of bug kill
wood coming into Williams Lake
mills (Riverside, Lignum and
Weldwood), and predicts that will
increase in the future. Log are com-
ing in from the Quesnel Forest
District as mills in Quesnel can’t
keep up with the flow. Brother Fisher
also expresses concerns that the epi-
demic has gotten out of control. “I

think that the industry and the gov-
ernment are doing too little too late,”
he says. “The (B.C. Liberal) cutbacks
to Ministry of Forest’s staff are caus-
ing further problems. There’s just
not enough staff left out there to
oversee the situation.”

A locally-based group called the
“Denim Pine Marketing Associa-
tion” has trademarked the name
Denim Pine to help promote bug kill
wood products.

Less affected but still concerned is
Local 1-417, which is seeing pockets
of bug kill near Merrit and Cache
Creek. To control the spread, areas
are felled and then sprayed with
chemicals that attract the beetles.
That way they don’t get into adjacent
standing timber. The wood is then
loaded out before it turns colour to
be milled. “A few loads are reaching
our mills at this point in time,” says
local president Joe Davies.

Clayoquot; the Ucluelet, Tla-o-qui-
aht, Ahousaht, and Hesquiaht First
Nations; the Pacific Rim National
Park Reserve, the IWA and
International Forest Products.

The society, with its many part-
ners, also receives support from
local businesses, and has carried
numerous fish and ecoforest restora-
tion projects, creating local employ-
ment, and training along with creat-
ing local capacity and stewardship
values. In 1993 Dziama and hundreds
of other IWAers lost their logging
jobs following a series of infamous
clashes with blockading environmen-
talists in the Clayoquot Sound. After
going through adjustment programs,
a handful of workers clung to life in
Ucluelet, determined to stay and
make contributions to once vibrant
communities. Today the CWFS is lin-
ing up numerous jobs (about 10
FTE's per year) related to sustainable
resource management and environ-
mental restoration.

DECEMBER 2002 THE ALLIED WORKER | 15