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The Forest Practices program in the Fort Nelson Forest District assists licensees by facilitating
access to as much known resource data about the district as is possible. Once a licensee
formulates and submits an FSP, the
Tenures program
reviews it and provides recommendations to the District Manager for consideration. When the
District Manager approves the FSP, the Forest Practices program will continue its involvement to
evaluate if the results and strategies in the FSP are working.
FRPA legislation came into effect on January 31, 2004 requiring all major licensees and BCTS
operations throughout BC to have FSP's in place by December 31, 2005. There has been a
province-wide extension of this deadline to December 31, 2006. And a further extension to March
31, 2007.
Forest Stewardship Plans are necessitated by new legislation - the
Forest and Range Practices Act (FRPA).
These FSP’s are envisioned to replace three requirements under previous legislation: the Forest
[aka Five-year] Development Plans (FDP’s), Silviculture Prescriptions (SP’s) and Road Layout and
Design [aka Road Permits] requirements. In effect, reducing the legislated requirements for
submitting three documents to one before a Cutting Permit (CP) may be issued.
The FRPA legislation and regulations provide the legal foundation for FSP's. FSP’s will set out
results that forest companies must achieve to meet the standards for forest values like forest
inventory data, water quality, fish and wildlife, and biodiversity. Government is responsible
for establishing these standards.
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The Ministry of Forests and Range,
Forest Practices Branch is providing much of the support and guidance to implement
FRPA. This support and guidance is provided through the
FRPA Resource Evaluation Program (FREP). The main monitoring activity from the
FREP program that the Fort Nelson Forest District will utilize is
Resource Stewardship Monitoring (RSM). To find out more please visit the
FREP website.
One other MoFR branch that is providing licensee support, is the
Forest Analysis and Inventory Branch (FAIB). The
Information Support Project can provide licensees with a good summary of information
sources for developing an FSP.
FSP’s must reinforce the goals and objectives of land use plans, such as Land and Resource
Management Plans (LRMP’s). Both the Ministry of Water, Land and Air Protection and the Ministry
of Forests will enforce FSP’s according to provisions enabled by the Forest Practices Code.
A "non-legal tool" has been developed by the Ministry of Forests and partner ministries to aid
licensees and BCTS in the development of their FSP's. This tool is called the Objective Matrix
(OM). It is an 'evergreen' document, meaning that it is continually being updated as new
information becomes available. This does not mean it is 'inclusive' in its content. Each higher
level plan in BC should have an OM developed by the local Forest District office. The two
Fort Nelson OM's
developed are for the
Fort Nelson LRMP and the
M-KMP.
Our district colleagues in the South Island Forest District have developed a very thorough website
going into great detail regarding the
Objective Matrix
and all eleven (11) FRPA values. If you need greater detail to understand the OM's please visit
their website.
Please click on the link for the
FREP brochure which nicely summarizes the FREP program.
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There are two approved FSP's in effect for licensees operating in the Fort Nelson TSA:
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In March, 2007 Canfor's Fort Nelson operations had their FSP approved; and
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in May, 2008 BCTS Peace Liard TSO (Timber Sales Office) had theirs approved.
NOTE: The link between FSP’s and Forest Certification issues and documents, such as Sustainable
Forest Management Plans (SFMP) are not yet clear. But it is assumed that there will be a very
strong link. Canfor's operations in the Fort Nelson Forest District are tentatively defaulting
some of their FSP results and strategies to their already approved SFMP commitments.
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