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7 : ‘This week:
Feeding
the appetite —

for pulp —

Interior logging industry had

a problem — _ excessive
waste. Added to normal sawmill
waste were inferior trees that
couldn’t be used in the mill. This
was something new, but most of
the good sites had been logged
and the sites the industry was
moving onto at that time had a
greater percentage of defective
wood,

There was an easy solution,
though. It wasn’t cost-efficient to
haul the waste to coastal pulp
mills, so pulp mills were built in
the interior and the waste was
turned into something valuable...
wood chips. A rather neat solution
to a rather embarrassing problem,
everyone thought at the time. Not
only did we turn waste wood into
something valuable, but we created
new jobs at the same time.

But by the time the 1960s rolled
around, a new problem began to
surface. There wasn’t enough
waste to feed the chip-hungry pulp
mills. Here again, though, there
was an easy solution close at hand.

I n the late 1950's, the B,C.

i The B.C. Forest Service had

carved the province up into logical
areas years before this latest prob-
lem was even contemplated.
Basically, these different areas
either had trees or they didn’t. And
the areas with trees were then
divided up into much smaller
logical sites.

There were areas with good
timber that were easy to get at,
areas with good timber that were
not so easy to get at, and other
areas with trees that were substan-
dard and not worth harvesting at
all. Why not take this last category
and let the pulp mills turn these
inferior trees into chips? After all,
they weren’t any good for anything
else. Most of them weren’t even
pretty to look at.

So the deed was done. In the
early 1960’s the first ever Pulp
Harvesting Area, PHA #6, was
drawn on the map between Prince
George and Williams Lake. A
rather neat solution to a rather
complex problent... or so everyone
thought at the time. Not only did
we guarantee that the pulp mills
would never run out of chips, that
no jobs would ever be lost, but we
got rid of a bunch of inferior trees
at the same time. And these areas
of inferior trees would be
replanted... with more perfect trees.

years ago, and these

B solutions may be coming

back to haunt us. Tenure in Pulp
Harvesting Areas (PHA) was
offered in the form of Pulp Agree-
ments (PA). Let’s first determine
exactly what a Pulp Agreement is.
We find the following definition in
Ministry of Forests release, Forest
Management in British Columbia:

ut that was almost 30

"A pulpwood agreement provides
the holder of a wood residue pro-
cessing facility, without competi-
tion, a supply of wood fibre from
pulpwood stands, if sufficient
quantities of wood residues, or
by-products of conventional timber
processing, are not available to the
holder.

"An agreement covers: a 25-year
term, and. may be replaceable
every 10 years; a large area in one
or more timber supply areas.

"Harvesting authority is provided
through a Timber Sale Licence
where the licensee is responsible
for all operational planning, deve-
lopment, basic silviculture and
forest protection."

In other words, a pulp mill
(wood residue processing facility)
has sole access (without competi-
tion) to a supply of inferior timber
{pulpwood stands) if normal
sources of fibre supply prove to be
inadequate. In other words, if the
regular logging industry doesn’t
provide a large enough supply of
inferior trees, and/or other woods

fill a balloon with too much air it
will burst. And in the same way,
so might the economic bubble of
the pulp industry one day.

“Hogwash," you say? Then per-
haps you also don’t believe the
Fall Down Effect exists. Because
that’s what we’re really talking
about here. We cut poorer quality
trees each year because there are
fewer high quality trees left. And
before we can grow a new crop of
high quality trees to maturity, we
won't have any of the existing
forest left at all.

nd it might even be worse

A than that. Not only might

the few trees we have left

be of little or no value, it’s very

possible the damage we've already

caused to our environment has

forever altered the ecosystems

which exist in our province. And
‘not for the better. —

,,,10 understand this, let’s take a

wastes, to keep a pulp mill operatacis-

ing at capacity, they can go out

and clear cut as much of the area —

covered under their Pulp Agree-
ment as they need.

It could be argued that this is a
good airangement. Obviously pulp
mills represent a considerable
investment by private industry and
need to operate at a certain level of
productivity if they are to be con-
sidered economically viable. If
they can’t maintain that level of
productivity, the company is going
to have to decide at some point
that it is better to shut the
operation down than continue to
operate at a loss.

It doesn’t take any real measure
of intelligence to understand that
this would mean economic devas-
tation for many B.C. communities.
"Ghost town" could become the
buzz-word of the nineties. So in
reality, we don’t really have any
other choice. We have to offer the
pulp industry some form of
security. And Pulp Agreements
give the industry that security in
the form of a guaranteed source of
supply. But Pulp Agreements also
give the industry the collateral they
need when they decide they want
to borrow money in order to
expand. And you may detect a bit
of a problem here.

It makes good business sense to
expand a manufacturing facility if
it means you can sell more product
and increase your profits. But
manufacturing more pulp places a
greater demand on the raw
resource — our forests — and our
forests don’t seem to be living up
to the promise that we once
believed they had. If they were, we

wouldn't be logging inferior stands
of timber today. So there’s a truth
here that must be realized. If you

“4ook of what really exists within
“ the boundaries of a Pulp Harvest-
ing Area. We’ve already said that
the trees are inferior, but we
haven’t said why. Pulp Harvesting
Areas ‘consist of wetland timber,
deciduous stands, and mid-slope to
sub-alpine regions that have never
before been included in the Annual
Allowable Cut. Why? Because
these areas were below utilization
standards set by the’ Ministry of
Forests. That is, the amount of
usable wood per hectare wasn’t
large enough to make the trees
worth harvesting.

But now they are, or will be.
And if you go back to the 11
articles we did on “Ecology and
Management" earlier this year you
will fully understand the potential
for disaster here. Swamps, or
swampy areas, are an important
part of the ecosystem. They are

crawling with bugs and insects and
are havens for birds and small

animals. It’s never been proven
man can successfully recreate
every complex detail of an ordi-
hary swamp, so until it is proven,
wisdom should dictate we leave
them alone.

And what happens when we cut
trees in the upper regions of our
mountains? In truth, we . really
don’t know because the results are
always complex and unpredictable.
What we do know, however, is
that it will probably have a perma-
hent and undesirable effect on our
environment.

If you have never had the oppor-
tunity to visit the mid- and upper-
slopes of our surrounding moun-
tains, you have at least seen pic-
tures of thinly-forested summer-
time meadows dotted with alpine
flowers and winter scenes of a
wind-blown arctic desert. Life is

" Terrace Review ~ Wednesday, September 12,1999 AZ

Forestry

by Tod Strachan, in consultation with Rod Amold and Doug Davies

difficult for plant life in these
regions, with only a thin layer of
soil, a two- to three-month grow-
ing season, and summertime highs
that rarely reach 70 degrees
Fahrenheit.

hese areas are far more

than just pretty pictures,

though. They make up
more than 80 percent of the pro-
vince’s forested area and are an
important primary source of nut-
rients for the valuable timber on
the slopes and valleys below. And
like swampy lowlands, once dis-
turbed, are difficult if not impos-
sible to replace.

Clear cut these upper slopes and
the thin layer of soil that took
hundreds of years to form is left
exposed to the elements. Unpro-
tected, much of this soil will either
be washed down the mountain side

_by the spring thaw or rain — a

phenomenon called a nutrient
avalanche, or simply be blown
away by unrelenting winds.

~ Just as devastating, clear cutting
has probably changed the climate.
No longer protected from the
effects of nearby glaciers by trees
and shrubs, temperatures plummet.
An unhindered summer breeze can
lower the temperature of the area
by as much as 30 degrees Fahren-
heit. This cools the remaining soil,
causing it to lose its ability to host
any significant forms of plant life.
In other words, we’ve turned 4
sub-alpine meadow into an alpine
desert. Two hundred years of natu-
ral evolution have been lost.

And we can’t predict how devas-
tating these changes might be to
the lower slopes. A nutrient ava-
lanche means nutrients that would

‘have supported growth on the

lower slopes for many years are
washed out fo sea in a single sea-
son. Because the upper slope area
has been significantly cooled, ice
and snow may not melt as
expected and there will be a shor-
tage of water.

These examples, of course, are
worst-case scenarios and there are
some upper slope areas that can be
logged... if the job is done right.
But we have little or no informa-
tion to help us decide exactly what
is "right", All we know for certain
is that nature hasn’t been able to
grow a good crop of trees in these
regions, and there is no evidence at
all that we can do any better by
cutting everything down and plant-
ing a new crop.

We have toiask ourselves then:
what are we really doing? Are we
maintaining our forests and econ-
omy for future generations? Or are
we simply maintaining private
industry for a few more years by
destroying our environment? If we
have absolute confidence we have
the situation under control, perhaps

we should proceed. But if the latter
is true, we have to understand that
once our forests are gone, the pulp
and lumber industry will go the
way of the dinosaur anyway. And
there will be little forest left for
future generations to manage.

Next week, we'll take a look at
the remaining forms of tenure.

Child Car Seat
Safety Check

on

Saturday, September 22, 1990

from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
at

ICBC Claim Center
4612 Keith Avenue, (Highway 16)

Special thanks to the following
organizations:

e ICBC

@ Paragon Insurance Agency Ltd.
@ Wightman & Smith Insurance
Agencies Ltd

@ Skeena Health Unit
@ Terrace Co-op

nag : in