The State of British Columbia’s Forests

The latest BC report on forests is informative, however one get the feeling that it is timber industry (perhaps old forester) centric. The first impression comes from the data available and not available. British Columbia is a province that has economically depended on its forest resources for some time. Given the length of time citizens have expressed concerns about the possible loss of biodiversity, soil productivity, water quality and flow water, more data should be available.

The second impression comes from how certain issues have been portrayed. The example on the top of my mind is genetic diversity. The issue with forest genetic diversity that most of the world is talking about is not just tree biodiversity, although that is part of it. An example might be the loss of populations of caribou in certain regions because of the forest management regimes practiced there. This is the manner in which the Montreal Process indicator speaks to the issue. Remember the CBD people are looking at this report for information, and to get a sense of whether you can be trusted with ecosystem management.

A third impression came when reading about changing forest dynamics (fire, harvest, bugs) which are summed up as changed biomass. This if course means trees which will be interpreted by some to mean investments, future harvests etc. But as we know forest dynamics is understood as spatial, temporal and factors affecting ecosystem relationships such as age class distribution, fragmentation, disturbance frequency etc. The bottom line outcomes of concern being:
• Changes in wildlife populations
• Unnatural fuel accumulation in fire ecosystems
• Loss of arboreal epiphytes, etc.

The point of these observations is to encourage that the reports be sensitive to the sophistication of public criticism of forest management practices. Recasting issues as foresters might see them might well backfire by creating the impression among critics that the forest management sector can not or will not hear and respond to the issues.

One might say this is a result of available data, recast to address new issues. That defense will not fly. It is best to capture the public issues as accurately and completely as possible and present the best data available and admit to the gaps. Then promise you will do better. If you have not already worn that excuse out, it should work.

Thanks for the web site and the opportunity to comment. BC is a fantastic place.

I have instructed the FII staff to use it as their first source of stats, given that it represents official government figures.

I couldn't find any explanation of how you determined if an indicator was good, mixed, declining, etc. How were they scored and did you use a threshold to determine good from bad, etc? Was it quantitative or qualitative?

Is it possible to purchase a hard copy of this report? If so how and where? If not why not? The Electronic version is extremely difficult to download and print especially if one has to do this on their home computer with only a black and white printer and a land line to boot!!

I’d like to pass along my compliments. It is an exceptional report: the criteria are relevant, the data appears robust, and the report is easy to read without being simplistic. I hope it is widely used as it could bring some needed perspective to the ongoing debate regarding forest management and use.