Timber Supply — Issue No. 11 — Wednesday, June 20, 2012 (HTML)

Present: John Rustad, MLA (Chair); Norm Macdonald, MLA (Deputy Chair); Harry Bains, MLA; Donna Barnett, MLA; Eric Foster, MLA; Bill Routley, MLA; Ben Stewart, MLA

1. The Chair called the Committee to order at 8:13 a.m. and made opening remarks.

2. The following witnesses appeared before the Committee and answered questions:

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.
The printed version remains the official version.

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON
TIMBER SUPPLY


CONTENTS
Page
Presentations	299
R. MacDougall
R. Hamilton
L. Pedersen
L. Thomas
C. Leon
R. Mitchell
G. Stewart
B. McLean
T. Greenaway
L. Chernowski
E. Lepka
D. Abraham
B. Mayes
J. Salokannel
K. Gordon

J. Rustad (Chair): Good morning, everyone. Welcome to our committee meeting here this morning, in Fort St. James, of the Special Committee on Timber Supply. My name is John Rustad. I'm the MLA for Nechako Lakes and the Chair of the committee. The committee has been tasked to look at our mid-term fibre supply and the impacts of the mountain pine beetle epidemic, and to try to find ways to mitigate some of those impacts from the mountain pine beetle epidemic.

I'd like to start off this morning with introducing the members of the committee, starting on my far left.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Norm Macdonald, MLA for Columbia River–Revelstoke.

J. Rustad (Chair): Travelling along with the committee members is Kate Ryan-Lloyd, who is our Deputy Clerk and Clerk of Committees. At the back of the room is Jacqueline Quesnel, who is also with the Clerk's office.

We also have Hansard staff with us. The Hansard staff that are here today are Michael Baer and Monique Goffinet. I hope I've got…. By the end of the tour I will be able to pronounce these names correctly.

Everything that we do as part of this committee is done in the public and is recorded by Hansard. It is broadcast on the Internet through our website, which is www.leg.bc.ca/timbercommittee.

As well, that website has all of the background information that has been provided to the committee with regards to timber supply, the annual allowable cut process and the various issues and values on the land base as well as, of course, the information around the mountain pine beetle epidemic. So it's a wealth of information for those that are interested.

It also is the site for giving us written submissions. The process that we're going through in terms of the community input will carry on through to the end of the week of the ninth of July, but people have until the 20th of July to be able to give us written submissions through that website.

Once we have all of the public input and the written submissions, we'll compile that information. The committee will go into some deliberations on recommendations. The final report by the committee is due by August 15, which is a very short time frame for such a very serious issue, but we are doing our best to be able to garner the input and come forward with what we hope will be some recommendations that can help to mitigate the impact.

Just to be clear in terms of the magnitude of the impact we're talking about, the mountain pine beetle epidemic, as it's running its course through the area between the Houston/Smithers area down to 100 Mile House and perhaps down into the Kamloops area as well….

It's estimated that the drop in the timber supply across that area will be in the magnitude of around ten million cubic metres per year, which is equivalent to about eight pretty reasonably sized sawmills. So it's a very serious issue that we are looking at, and our goal is to try to find ways to minimize what that impact could be.

Part of the community discussion process that we're doing is to have a round table with mayor and council, have another round-table discussion with chief and councils from the local bands and then to have an opportunity for a public input session as well. The round table is set up to be a presentation but also more of a conversation type of thing. Obviously, anything that happens, recommendations or no recommendations, could potentially have a significant impact on various communities.

Having said all of that, what I'd like to do at this moment is turn the meeting over to our first group, which is, of course, the mayor and council. So I'll turn it over to you, Mayor Rob MacDougall, and we'll go from there.

R. MacDougall: Thank you. On behalf of mayor and council for the district of Fort St. James, I'd like to welcome the Special Committee on Timber Supply to our community. I do that on behalf of the residents as well.

With me today I have Ross Hamilton. Ross is the manager of our community forest and has helped me prepare this presentation. He's what I guess we'd a call technical adviser. I'll give a brief introduction. Then I would ask Ross to provide the bulk of the presentation, and then I'll have a brief wrap-up.

With that, I'd just like to say that the purpose of this discussion is to provide input from the community of Fort St. James on the proposed mitigation strategies to counter the reduced allowable annual cuts associated with the post–mountain pine beetle mid-term timber
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supply.

The topics that will be put forward are taken from the mid-term timber supply mitigation options, a Special Committee on Timber Supply presentation from June 6. The single largest concern is the sustainability of the community of Fort St. James, and we are approaching these concepts in that context.

I was going to address some of the mitigation options just on their own. I'll start with visual quality objectives. The overall ability of visual quality objectives to increase the mid-term timber supply is relatively minor and is a significant public perception issue with harvesting in visually sensitive areas.

However, it's widely known that the visual quality objectives in the Prince George TSA are excessive and in some cases don't meet the intended objectives, especially when coupled with the mountain pine beetle kill. However, visual quality does remain an important resource in the Fort St. James forest district, particularly when associated with watercourses and other recreational areas.

We have a recommendation or a suggestion, and that is that current visual quality objectives and thresholds need to be rationalized to be efficient and effective, but certainly not abandoned in visually sensitive areas, especially when associated with lakes and rivers. We have the Stuart-Trembleur-Takla system and the Nation Lakes system, to name a couple.

A good example of some of the visual-quality objectives to drop would be the North Road visual-quality corridor. For those of us who are familiar with it, we know it's not that effective. As well, lower-use sites associated with smaller lakes could be reduced to allow more of the viewscape to be altered without impacting the visual experience for the users — kind of a rationalization of what exists.

For old-growth management areas and stand-level biodiversity, OGMAs, stand-level biodiversity and landscape-level biodiversity all impact timber supply, and it's important to rationalize and revisit the spatial impacts of these features on timber supply periodically.

In the case of Fort St. James, landscape-level biodiversity has a significant impact on mid-term timber supply. There are only three guidance OGMAs in the Prince George TSA, and they're not in the Fort St. James forest district. In Fort St. James, old-growth management areas are not defined but are managed aspatially through the landscape biodiversity order.

There's currently a joint government-industry working group, called the LOWG group, which works on landscape-level biodiversity. Our recommendation and suggestion is to support the joint industry-government working group in the review of biodiversity management in the TSA in order to evaluate and arrive at options for mitigating mid-term timber supply shortfalls by reviewing landscape-level biodiversity constraints. This group has been working on this stuff for years, so they're probably pretty good people to talk to about that.

On the topic of ungulate winter range. For the most part, Fort St. James district has a limited amount of quality mid-term timber associated with the ungulate winter range. The largest UWRs are intended to protect caribou and mountain goat and are in supply block A, B-rail and B-truck, substantially north of here.

Some smaller UWRs around the community target mule deer winter range. There are certain and somewhat restrictive harvesting techniques that can currently be applied in ungulate winter range, but it's quite a limited area that is close to town.

The recommendation is that the opportunity to offset mid-term timber supply shortfalls by accessing ungulate winter range is minimal at best and not likely to significantly affect mid-term timber supply in the Fort St. James district. Now, this is specific to Fort St. James. In other districts with widespread mule deer winter range, there might be other options there. It's just that most of our area is tied up with caribou and mountain goat and doesn't typically have great-quality timber.

Riparian and stand-level biodiversity. The purpose of a riparian area reserve or WTP is to protect or manage some features associated with water, temperature quality and flow, habitat corridors, predator evasion, etc. The political palatability of harvesting riparian reserves is quite low.

As well, it would be very difficult to be consistent with the FRPA guidelines should we drop the riparian reserve criteria. The recommendation is to encourage prudent use of the timber harvesting land base by not overprescribing riparian reserves but to leave the regulation intact. There probably is a tendency for people to overprescribe riparian reserves.

The conclusions on visual-quality objectives, old-growth management areas, ungulate winter ranges, riparian features and stand-level biodiversity. From the perspective of the community of Fort St. James, there are some limited opportunities to positively affect mid-term timber supply by rationalizing some of the management strategies related to these features. Abandoning these strategies wholesale is problematic from a regulatory, political or professional perspective.

Other concerns are that if we abandon these strategies, we may be disconnected from the legislated FRPA values. By increasing the allowable annual cut by minimizing constraints, the Crown may be preventing licensees from being compliant with FRPA. So any changes have to be followed with changes in FRPA to make sure that we're consistent with what we're doing in regulation.

Abandoning or reducing the areas associated with
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these strategies may impair businesses' ability to meet certain certification requirements. Most, in fact, rely upon an effective system to manage these features. A lot of certification strategies rely on government policies and regulation and often cite them in their certification documents.

Timber supply is one of the big ones. It's important that we're term-specific. If we relax constraints to free up timber in the mid-term, we need to make sure that that increased timber supply comes on and is available in the mid-term. So it's more of a timing of the freed-up volume. And eliminating or severely reducing constraints directed at environmental, wildlife or water protection isn't politically palatable.

For the topic of timber flow. This discussion cannot be had without addressing inventory. There's growing concern regarding the veracity of inventory numbers and other forest health concerns, and there remains an unbalanced age class distribution in the non-pine, which is complete with its own set of forest pathogens.

Also of concern are the mixed pine-spruce-balsam stands once we're in the mid-term. An approach to prioritize these stands is critical to maintaining as much timber as possible into the mid-term. There will not be a clear switch to green and healthy timber ten years from now once the mid-term starts. It doesn't just end. There are forest health concerns, mixed beetle stands that we'll be targeting throughout the mid-term as well.

There will always be stands to prioritize to minimize losses. We're not mortgaging the future by taking spruce-balsam stands that are over 50 percent dead and dying if we take those stands earlier within the mid-term. So some attention has to be given to how we schedule the stands.

Our recommendations are an inventory update of the non-pine leading stands intended for the mid-term timber supply with regard to age class, merchantable volume per hectare and forest health. Within the mid-term period, define the harvest priority and revisit. Ensure accurate inventory of the growing stock to define the duration and scope for the mid-term. I realize quite a bit of this work is being done, but it's important for the communities to understand what's left and what's going to happen over time. In this case, more information is probably better.

Reductions in cuts should be staged down. This will allow businesses and market forces to rationalize themselves.

Consider front-loading the mid-term harvest levels to ensure that forest health concerns are adequately addressed. Age class 8 and 9 spruce-balsam stands are not likely to remain intact over the 40-year mid-term period.

For the topic of merchantability definition. Increased allowable annual cuts relating to reduced merchantability is only viable if it reflects actual harvesting and manufacturing behaviour. Otherwise, it simply liquidates the economic mid-term timber supply more quickly. This will require some vigorous work around defining what these stands are and to ensure harvesting behaviour reflects the increased cut associated with these stands. This is related to the discussion on silviculture as well.

Our recommendations are to offer partitioned harvesting opportunities outside of the historic merchantability or utilization standards and outside of the mid-term allowable annual cut. This would give firms the option to participate in marginal utility stands.

Economic assumptions that are key to setting the mid-term allowable annual cut should be based on actual harvesting and manufacturing behaviour, and this could be shifted as things change should we find ways to utilize that type of fibre.

Encourage harvesting and utilization of stands that target reduced merchantability, both in the near-term and mid-term. I guess that any time we can get better use out of the forest resource by stretching utilization, it has the effect of increasing timber supply.

On amalgamation of management units. The Prince George timber supply area is an amalgamation of three forest districts, each with very different mid-term timber supply realities. It's imperative to the community at Fort St. James that the facilities that currently operate within the community have adequate timber to sustain themselves throughout the mid-term from the local forest district.

Significant mid-term pressure will be exercised on the Fort St. James timber supply through the association with the other two districts. Currently, harvesting is going to be focused on Fort St. James for the immediate salvage of pine. Post-salvage, there will continue to be pressure on Fort St. James non-pine stands. So it's important to the community that our local facilities are not left without access to an adequate timber supply in the mid-term.

Post-salvage, amalgamation of the TSAs is of limited benefit within areas that are heavily impacted by MPB. There could be advantages in amalgamating TSAs outside the mountain pine beetle areas with those within the mountain pine beetle areas.

So we had a suggestion. To avoid a large portion of the Prince George TSA mid-term cut from moving to Fort St. James, consider amalgamating undercut or an economically depressed district with districts of high timber consumption and poor mid-term prospects.

We came up with an example of the Nadina, Lakes, Bulkley, Kalum and Kispiox TSAs. In this example, infrastructure and transportation could be improved west to east, and it's probably better than it is north to south, if you take a look at the Fort St. James forest district. This could have the effect of increasing the economics in the more depressed TSAs in the northwest.

Intensive silviculture, alternative species and fertiliza-
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tion. All manner of intensive silviculture and alternative forestry are preferred options for mitigating the effect of the mid-term falldown. This creates employment and economic opportunities and increases the value of the Crown asset.

To have an impact, the scope has to be broad and ongoing. This requires a substantial financial commitment from the government. Significant gains in mid-term allowable annual cut can be made from increasing the growing stock by targeting the harvesting and regeneration of dead pine stands that are currently outside the range of merchantability and/or will not regenerate substantially on their own.

Our recommendation is to evaluate all of the potential treatments and prioritize to target increased mid-term timber supply. Government has to make the substantial financial commitment as well as a substantial change in the perceptions to allow this type of investment on a large scale.

Tenureship from volume- to area-based. From the perspective of the community of Fort St. James, local area-based tenures are important. Community forests, woodlots, First Nations woodlands tenures and TFLs are all important for security of fibre and land base, but only insofar as they provide security in the mid-term and long-term fibre supply and that they have the adequate species composition to do that.

In severely impacted areas it's not certain whether a shift to area-based tenure would translate into a meaningful increase in mid-term timber supply. Reallocation of the boundaries and tenure type does not actually increase the physical existence of mid-term timber. The assumption is based on intensive investment in silviculture, so that would have to happen for the area-based reallocation to work.

On the small and local scale, finalize local area-based tenures for communities as quickly as possible. The Fort St. James community forest and the Nak'azdli woodlands licence are great examples of this.

Economics of low-quality stands. Low-quality stands are, in effect, similar to the stands outside of historic utilization. Any manufacturer that utilizes this material should be encouraged, and tenures to accommodate unrecovered mountain pine beetle losses should be targeted to those operators that can use the volume and get the land back into production — bioenergy, smallwood manufacturing, engineered wood products, etc.

A stand can be of low quality for a range of different reasons — low volume, low piece size, poor lumber recovery — which could represent a substantial negative value. To improve the economics of these stands, a critical piece would be the Crown's recognition of the substantial negative values.

Our recommendations are to offer partitioned harvesting opportunities outside of the historic merchantability or utilization standards and outside of the mid-term AAC. This will give firms the option to participate in marginal-utility stands, should they see an opportunity there.

Consider allowing more opportunity to blend lower-quality stands with higher-quality stands in the context of appraisal. This can steer as infrastructure as well. An example would be allowing licensees to blend blocks greater than ten kilometres apart. That way, it would allow licensees to take some of the good with more of the bad.

Recognize the substantial negative values as rehabilitation projects more so than is currently done through the Forests for Tomorrow program.

R. MacDougall: Any discussion around mid-term timber supply mitigation should answer the questions: "Why?" and "What are the goals?" From the perspective of the community of Fort St. James, we are not simply trying to sustain timber throughout the mid-term. We are trying to sustain the community and the businesses that operate here.

The community of Fort St. James is very concerned about the focused mid-term harvesting levels within the local forest district, which has a potential to impact the future timber supply for our local manufacturers.

For Fort St. James, any successful strategy has to contemplate the following: recognizes that there are simply not enough mid-term timber supplies to sustain all of the businesses within the TSA at historic harvest levels, does not unduly jeopardize the future of one community for another.

This leads to the domino effect. Today's solution is tomorrow's problem. Increases in mid-term harvest levels associated with reduced constraints should be allocated to the defined mid-term period. Support the proven local businesses first, both harvesters and manufacturers.

J. Rustad (Chair): Thank you very much, Rob and Ross, for that presentation. I'll open it up to committee members, starting with Norm.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Thank you very much. First, you've laid this out very, very nicely for us, and I appreciate it very much.

A couple of quick questions. You said a lot of the certifications depend on the government management and things like that. I presume three main certifications. By "a lot," do you mean, like, all of them, or is there one that doesn't depend on that? Or was it just a phrase you used?

R. Hamilton: Most of the certifications that I'm familiar with — SFI and, I believe, CSA — in their certification documents will refer to the government's regulation and their strategy for managing the resource as an acceptable one.
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N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Okay. So basically for any changes we have to think through the impacts on certification. Basically, that's the warning you're giving to us — right?

R. Hamilton: Sure. Right. Some of these features, how they're managed…. A certification document would say that the government handles this through regulation, and they handle it quite well.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): All right, good. You've talked about a lack of inventory. I know that provincially that has come up quite a bit, but locally you see that through your experience as well — that the inventory issue is noticeable locally? It's something that there needs to be more investment…? Is that what you're saying, or is this coming…?

R. Hamilton: We believe it needs to be updated and that because the nature of the resource is changing so much, it's important to have a very accurate understanding of what's actually on the land base.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): All right, so you're saying that in a time of change, you need inventory updated more often rather than wait for the change to, you know, go through and then invest in inventory. Is that what you're saying? Part of the argument we have provincially is that argument to just wait until the change is complete and then invest in inventory. But you're saying you need it while the change goes on so that you can adapt management?

R. Hamilton: I don't think the change in forest inventory is ever complete. It's ongoing.

R. Hamilton: We're talking about different pathogens and different stands, growth and yield, things like that. I think it's critical to understand exactly what we have.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): The timber flow recommendations — can they happen now? A lot of what you're saying seems very reasonable to a layman. How flexible are the management opportunities that you have?

The things that are in place under the current regulatory regime — most of these things could be done? Is there that flexibility within a local unit, or is it something where there'd have to be regulatory change to do the things that you're recommending here?

R. Hamilton: I think policy could do it. The inventory is more of a decision on the Crown land base for investment to get it done. The other stuff is policy and could be licensee-driven if it's collective.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Okay. Two other quick questions. You're talking about…. When we were in Fraser Lake — this is under the merchantability definitions — we were talking about areas that weren't included in the AAC, but the companies involved were still able to go in and get the timber because they were in proximity to, and they had infrastructure in place and things like that.

But the warning you're giving us is that you shouldn't count those as possibility unless you're absolutely sure that the market will support going into those areas. Is that the warning that you're giving in those recommendations?

R. Hamilton: The cut has to match what you're actually using — right? If we base a cut, and we do use the timber that's outside of the timber-harvesting land base on occasion, the cut that you're generating mathematically has to follow what you're harvesting — right?

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Of course, the temptation is to think: "Oh, there's…."

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Yeah. "Let's overestimate. This can solve it." But what you're saying is that if the markets don't make it so that you can actually go into these areas, you could be setting up a problem in the years to come. That's the warning that I pick up from what you're saying.

I had one other quick question. Under the recommendations it says — and this goes to intensive silviculture, where you're talking about investments in the land: "…as well as a substantial change in the perceptions to allow this type of investment on a large scale."

I wonder what you mean by that. Where does the perception have to change? Does it have to be a political perception that we should take public funds and invest in the land? Is that what you mean by it? Or what does that sentence mean?

R. Hamilton: We have in the past made substantial
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investment commitments to silviculture through FRDA and through…. I guess it was FRBC that was the last one. Those weren't even done in the context of a catastrophic event, the mountain pine beetle. I think it's important that we invest back into the resource, to do what we can to improve it.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): By that, you're saying this committee and politicians that are aware of these issues have to go and make the case to the public at large in the province that these investments in the land are worthwhile and should be made. Is that…?

R. Hamilton: The licensees have harvesting rights, but ultimately, the resource is the Crown's. We have to take, as a province, a look at our resource and make sure we're taking care of it and doing the best we can to improve it.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Okay. Thank you for the work you've done. This is really wonderfully laid out, and I very much appreciate it.

B. Routley: Yes, I agree. It's well laid out, and I appreciate the thoughtfulness with which you've put this together. Some of the recommendations are very well laid out.

I guess my central question about all of them is: are you aware of any legislative changes that would have to occur to do any of the things that you've recommended, or could they all be done within the existing legislative framework, as far as you know?

R. Hamilton: I'd have to take a better look at it, more thoroughly. I'm sure there are some.

J. Rustad (Chair): Sorry, if I could just interrupt for a second. One of the people that I did not introduce earlier, and I apologize, is one of our special advisers, Larry Pedersen, former chief forester. We have two special advisers that are helping with the committee.

What I'm actually going to do is turn that question over to you, Larry. It may be inappropriate because you've obviously just had a first read, but you might get an opportunity to be able to give us a little bit of insight into what that may require.

Based on what I heard, largely it's about varying existing direction that has been established under the existing statutory framework. For example, the old-growth orders or the visual-quality objectives are established within a framework that allows for those very set objectives to be varied and moved to some other objective with another reasonable rationale. For the most part, I believe what I've heard can be done that way.

The broader question around some of the bigger policy questions, about TSA amalgamation and so on, might require a different response to that. Right now the minister and the province can set those boundaries, but I would have to look closer at the framework to make a determination whether that could be done exactly inside the current statutory framework. Most of the practices changes can be accommodated.

B. Routley: Well, following up on that, I think you've…. You used the word "catastrophic," which is interesting. I was thinking about the same thing the last couple of days, in terms of the kind of problem that we're dealing with really has the potential for catastrophic impacts, not just to communities but to the environment. I mean, you've got serious environmental concerns with the impacts of the beetle.

I've heard communities talk about don't choose between our community and the environment or choose between one community and another. I think the reality is that the pine beetle is doing that work for us. It's not something that we went out of the way to look for. The pine beetle, unfortunately, has found our regions and has brought the problem to us.

In terms of the catastrophic nature of really what's happening here, would you recommend that there be a relook at some of the mid-term — well, not just mid-term — timber supply? You talk specifically about inventory.

The land use planning that has gone on, particularly the ones that are somewhat outdated and overtaken by the catastrophic events. Would you recommend that we should focus on bringing those groups back together to update those land use plans, given the catastrophic nature, and review all of the recommendations that you've put forward here?

J. Rustad (Chair): I have myself next on the list. We just have a couple more minutes.

Through what you've talked about — the flow of fibre; how you access the types of stands; the various age categories; the types of management decisions, I guess, that you're suggesting on the land base — do you believe that those options would be easier to resolve through actual area-based management and the types of decisions that could be made through that?

I guess the question would be: through the community forest in the area you have, are you making those types of decisions now on the land base through how you manage the community forest components?

R. Hamilton: Yeah. The answer is yes to both. You prioritize. The same logic should apply to the…. We've been
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doing that, for the most part, with mountain pine beetle.

J. Rustad (Chair): The question, I guess, that raises is: what would be required to be able to do that under a volume-based system? Or would it just be more efficient if we were to shift some of that over to area-based as opposed to trying to find ways to, I guess, direct how those management decisions should be made under a volume base?

R. Hamilton: I think there are a lot of policy tools that are available to government that would be able to steer that in the right direction. I think we're currently under partition in Fort St. James. Similar types of things could be done.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Quickly, what's your volume that comes out of the community forest?

R. Hamilton: The long-term cut is 23,000, but we're working on expansion there, which should bring it to just under 40,000 or around 40,000.

Then maybe just to the mayor, the issues that we're dealing with have been around for a long time and were brought to a head perhaps in Burns Lake and a few other communities. I mean, these are not new.

The mechanisms. We've talked about investment. There was a $1 billion commitment from the federal government that ended up being $200 million. There was also the pine beetle coalition work, and that was the vehicle for dealing with some of these issues.

I guess the question to the mayor is…. There have been the recommendations. Has that so far worked into something practical on the ground, or is that something the community was highly involved with? Can you give us a sense of how well that worked in preparing the community for what we're dealing with, with the pine beetle?

R. MacDougall: I think we've relied on our licensees to take care of their portion, and we've relied on KDL to take care of our community forest. We've provided input through OBAC and some of the other committees on how we would like to see the pine beetle addressed.

For the most part, for us as a community I think one of the issues — and Ross has touched on it — is the inventory. We've been logging here in Fort St. James, and we're not certain just how much of the mountain pine beetle areas we've addressed. I'm not sure whether we have in fact met the chief forester's recommendation of the 70-30 mountain pine beetle and non-beetle stands that we were to address.

I think there's a grace period of a year to have the licensees work on how they can address those recommendations, and I think now we need to look and see if in fact they have met their obligations and then, moving forward, how we can perhaps mitigate a higher percentage of the pine-damaged stands.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): There's tremendous expertise within the ministry and within licensees. Do you have a sense that you have got the boots on the ground to really fully understand what's going on?

Here I'm talking about the ministry. Is there a sense you've got the boots on the ground still, that you get a sense of what's really going out on the public land so that the stewardship is up to a standard and the information is up to a level that you need to make informed decisions?

R. MacDougall: Absolutely. I mean, these people do this for a living. They are in the business, and they are successful. We feel that they are doing a good job. I think that those of us that work in the forest industry understand it. There may be some who don't understand it quite as well, so you leave that to the people who do that type of business. I think, for the most part, Fort St. James is very fortunate. We have excellent licensees here.

We have a great relationship with the Ministry of Forests. They keep us up to date on a regular basis. We talk about the different occurrences out in the bush and some of the challenges that we're facing. But I think for the most part, we have the qualified people to run the land base as well as anywhere in the province.

J. Rustad (Chair): Sorry. I hate to cut off the conversation, but I do have to try and keep us to the schedule.

R. MacDougall: Okay. With that, I'd like to thank the special committee for coming up and listening to our concerns. I would really ask that you keep us in the loop. If you have questions, please feel free to forward them to the district office. We can have Ross help us with answering them — or anybody, for that matter, the professionals that I talk about. Best of luck, and a safe journey.

J. Rustad (Chair): Committee members, we will go straight to our next presentation group, which is with the Nak'azdli and the Tl'azt'en First Nations. With the Nak'azdli is Carl Leon and Leonard Thomas, and with
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Tl'azt'en is Renel Mitchell, Vanessa Joseph and Bev John.

If I could ask you to come up. Welcome, and thanks for taking some time to come with us.

With that, thank you very much for taking some time to come and discuss with us.

L. Thomas: Thank you for allowing us to present. Apologies from the Chief, who is not here. He is on another trip today. He sent Coun. Carl Leon and myself, as the economic development coordinator, to present to you today.

One of the things I think I wanted to do is table a few documents with you regarding some of our issues with respect to the issue at hand. I realize that your job is very important to you, and whatever the result of these findings is, it is going to form the basis of some of the decisions coming down the road.

One of the things we didn't see on the terms of reference that have been distributed was the issue of our rights and title to the forestry resource in our area and how that should be distributed amongst our people.

As you know, the documents I've put in front of you are documents that relate to countless meetings we've had with the Ministry of Forests with respect to some of the requests that have been made by our band councils so that we could get access to a timber supply that is sustainable to our community. To date the only things that we have got are short-term licences, which expire.

Beetle licences. The last one we signed was a forest opportunity licence — a very small five-year licence that really doesn't do anything to sustain our community.

The second offer was a sustainable licence under the new First Nation forest licensing program that you have in place. The band council basically rejected that offer simply because the volume is just too small. I cannot see, for the life of me, how such small volumes can sustain our community. We have a population base of about 1,820 people on our reserve. A lot of them are dependent upon forestry, yet we are still getting small bits and pieces that are leftovers.

I think we're very concerned about what this group is doing, simply because the distribution of timber and the timber leaving town really concern us. I believe that the minister has to support what we are asking for before any further distribution of timber goes out of our territory.

Right now we have two large companies, West Fraser and Canfor, basically taking a lot of timber out of our area, and we don't have, really, any benefits from that. We don't have any opportunity to even sell any logs to anyone. Right now we don't really have a lot to come forward with. We're just coming to the table, basically asking again that someone has to start listening to what we are saying.

If there are some boundary realignments to address those that need the timber supply or that need to distribute the timber for the new construction of those tragic events that have happened, our council really doesn't support that.

We believe that the timber that is in our area should stay in our area and that the relationships we build with our local mills are basically strengthened through an equal distribution of timber to ourselves with the idea that that timber will be used from a business perspective through working with the local sawmills here in this area. That basically strengthens relationships.

I do have some of the concerns that were raised earlier regarding the visual effects. We think that the visual landscapes should stay the way they are. We don't think that any further timber should be taken from these areas. In some cases our people have been involved in some of this. Whenever a timber licence goes out or there's a stewardship plan being developed, many of our community members do participate with the companies so that they're involved in protecting certain areas.

To take some of those areas out is, in our view, not a good one. That goes for the riparian zones as well. A lot of our people are involved in that. What little bit that some of our householders, the keyoh holders, who have been very active in the last couple of years in protecting their areas…. It's basically looking for some additional conflict, which I don't think we need. As you can see, coming here I don't have a forest technician to bring forward to you to look at the forest legislation or those things that basically are required in terms of the Forest Act. That's because we can't afford to have a forest technician in our community. The last one we had basically had to be laid off because we didn't really have a forest licence to manage.

We have basically made arrangements outside so that we build a relationship with the local mills to manage the little pieces that we have right now. That's the sad state, I think, of the way our nation's forest management system is right now. It's non-existent.

In fact, every time that we have to deal with the forest matters, the only way we participate, and reluctantly, is having to deal with the consultation processes that are in place with the licensees, the Ministry of Forests and B.C. Timber Sales, and that's not a very healthy relationship for us.

That's the message that I wanted to bring forward to you — that I think there should be a fair and equal distribution of the timber with respect to what we are asking for. We don't come here just to raise those concerns. They should be something that you should seriously look at.
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C. Leon: Carl Leon, Nak'azdli Band councillor. My main concern is ECDA, which we haven't signed. We rejected it because it wasn't sustainable for us. We would like to have more timber supply in our area. We would like to see the timber be kept in Fort St. James, not bypass us. Like Leonard was saying, we need these supplies to sustain ourselves, and for our people. We do trade with the local mills as far as Burns Lake, for our finger-joint mill.

I think the provincial government is moving too fast on making changes — and the federal government. They're moving too fast on this. They're not going to realize it until after they do the damage — how much damage it's doing to our land, and stuff like that.

If you could see the flooding right now, that's environment. The trees are being cut too fast. You're going to see more of that in the future, more of this flooding, because the water sustains and the tree sustains that. It does a lot of damage to the environment in our area. That's my main concern.

R. Mitchell: My colleagues are travelling from Tache. They were planning for the 9:10 schedule time. I'll start, because I've prepared this presentation.

First of all, I'd like to thank you for the opportunity to present our concerns to the special committee. I won't reiterate the points put forth by Nak'azdli, but I would like to have it on record that I support the points that they've made. They're points that Tl'azt'en could have easily made as well.

I work in the natural resource department at Tl'azt'en Nation. I am responsible, along with my colleagues, for the forestry referrals. I look at every single cutblock that occurs within the Tl'azt'en traditional territory. I analyze it on an ecological basis to advocate for Tl'azt'en's values on the land, and I also evaluate it for potential cultural impacts in terms of subsistence activities that might be impacted. I am very intimately aware of the amount and type of forestry activity that is taking place within the territory.

The Tl'azt'en traditional territory encompasses approximately 723,000 hectares. Its communities are all situated at the tributaries up the Stuart-Takla watershed. The Tl'azt'en people live in that whole interior forest that you're going to be thinking about in terms of how we're going to mitigate mid-term timber supply.

Within our territory lies the uppermost reaches of the Fraser sockeye spawning tributaries, the Skeena sockeye in the lower Babine Lake. It includes the prime caribou habitat in the mountain ranges that straddle Takla Lake and scores of lakes that are filled with char, whitefish and rainbow trout. All these end up feeding the families of Tl'azt'en Nation. Moose, deer and grizzly bear, and all other land and aquatic mammals also know this area as their home.

As you well know, the Dakelh people have survived in this area because of the plentiful food, medicine and subsistence resources available here.

Today the Tl'azt'en Nation natural resource department is here to present to you the values of our nation as it relates to the mid-term timber supply review process.

To address the first point, what are the values and principles that should guide evaluation and decision-making, the Crown land is held in trust for the greater public good of our society. Our society has decided that forest resources must serve multiple values.

Our society values B.C. forests for the following reasons: its ecological significance at the global and local level; for providing biodiversity and water quality; for maintaining cornerstone wildlife species populations that are unique in the world; for providing recreation opportunities, including the means for people to connect closely with nature and the wilderness and to support the tourism sector; to provide sustenance, food, medicine and spiritual needs for First Nations people; and also to support the forestry sector.

How should decisions regarding potential actions to mitigate the timber supply impacts be made, and by whom? Decisions regarding potential actions to mitigate the timber supply impacts need to be in conjunction with First Nations.

At the provincial level we recommend that there be a First Nations panel of political leaders, forestry professionals and policy analysts to assess how any actions on behalf of the government impact three critical components of the land base as it relates to First Nations: one, how it will impact future treaty negotiations and future treaty settlements; and two, how these changes will impact the newly instituted FCRSA calculations, a new calculation on how revenue-sharing will occur between forest districts and the First Nations.

These are contingent on calculating revenue that comes from specific forest districts. Changes to administrative boundaries will impact how these calculations are made and, consequently, how much revenue may be allotted to a First Nation.

This First Nations panel also has to look at how future tenure opportunity agreements will impact First Nations. As Leonard said, First Nations are having a very hard time getting the most minute amount of wood that, of course, could never sustain their communities on the long term.

There's a lot of opportunity for First Nations to acquire more volume, but outside licensees, licensees that don't have an economic investment in Fort St. James, are kind
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of consuming all this volume. A First Nations panel will be able to address this issue in a more precise way.

The second recommendation is at the provincial level. We recommend that MARR, the Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation, participate with this panel to advise on their role in supporting negotiations for any impacts that the ministry eventually will make in terms of its decisions of mitigation measures. MARR is currently the only ministry capable of negotiating with First Nations and setting up things like strategic agreements.

The third recommendation is that this panel consult heavily with academics and scientists — forest ecologists, forest scientists, forest policy analysts — to guide their decision-making. The government has an inherent conflict of interest and should take advice from outside experts that will provide objective information. Decisions need to be made and based on the ecological limits of a natural resource.

I'd like to just break for a moment and introduce Vanessa Joseph, who is my colleague and works in the natural resource department with me.

The third point: "What specific information about our local area would your committee like to know?" Tl'azt'en Nation is governed by a keyoh system, which is a property rights system of land government and land stewardship. The keyoh holders of Tl'azt'en Nation are the land stewards of the nation, and they live off the land. They have a very close relationship with the resources. Government needs to acknowledge this cultural system of land rights and land governance in the decision-making process.

Tl'azt'en Nation area has been extensively exploited by forestry. There is extensive habitat fragmentation, increase in road density and increase in hydrological dysfunction. There has been a 50 percent reduction in regional moose populations since 2004. Our salmon-bearing streams are threatened by mining activities as well as current intensive logging practices.

The First Nations community is finding it harder to support its subsistence activities because of lack of access and diminishing wildlife habitat areas. The province cannot change policy that would result in further infringement on constitutionally enshrined aboriginal rights.

"What cautions and advice do you have for this committee in considering whether and how to mitigate mid-term timber supply?" Tl'azt'en Nation cautions against the relaxation of current constraints on forest resources. The principles of conservation must be upheld even in the toughest times, for it is during these times that those principles are most critical to maintain.

With regards to visual quality objectives, currently those objectives are protecting the majority of the traditional use sites that are used by Tl'azt'en and all the First Nations people in this area. The areas along the lakes and the waterways are the most productive areas. They constitute some of the most prime wildlife habitat for multiple wildlife species as well as providing important food plants and medicinal plants.

With regards to ungulate winter range, there is not very much, and I see by your analysis that the relaxation of any of these constraints only minimally increases timber supply anyway. The reason why there is so little here is because not all of the ungulate winter range is captured. In fact, there should be an increase in ungulate winter range areas because some of the prime habitat area isn't being captured in the current polygons that are available to licensees.

Tl'azt'en Nation is opposed to the use of fertilizer. We are already seeing beginning signs of increased nitrogen in the lakes that is causing algae blooms. We suspect — and this requires more research — that the nitrogen from the burn piles, with the lack of obstruction from the trees, is creating more nitrogen runoff into the lakes. That could be adversely affecting fish populations and the aquatic ecology.

That definitely should require more monitoring this summer. We're receiving more and more reports that there are algae blooms in lakes that people have never, ever seen in there before.

Forest companies and mills must do an economic assessment at their operations of future falldown volume. We need to see what actually their operations are at a six- or seven-million-cubic-metre volume for this area. Only after this analysis is done, can we understand what measures the government may take to protect economic stability of the local communities.

"How would you as an individual or a community want to be engaged in these considerations?" Tl'azt'en Nation considers itself the titleholder for the land base of their traditional territory. Therefore, Tl'azt'en Nation will sit down with the province on a government-to-government basis in a joint decision-making process. Ultimately, Tl'azt'en is sacrificing its own natural resources for the benefit of everyone else in society except its own nation, and that has to change.

Those are the points that you outlined in the discussion paper. I have, really briefly, four additional recommendations.

One is that this special committee look at the Association of B.C. Forest Professionals summary report, which had a peer-reviewed analysis of the mid-term timber supply review. They came up with what I thought were some very sound recommendations. Most importantly, there are changes that can be made now to protect some of the mid-term timber supply in the future. They outline that in that report. There are changes licensees can do now that will increase, and make more available, mid-term timber supply.

Two, there needs to be a more sufficient economic analysis of the falldown. What can actually be operationally feasible at six or seven million cubic metres?
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Thirdly, the Ministry of Forests needs to come to terms with the ecological limits of the future state of the natural resources to support economic activities. Forests are for more than just logs. There are multiple values that professional foresters are ethically bound to uphold in a resource that is held by the Crown for the greater public interest.

Lastly, the Ministry of Forests needs to be reminded the forest is currently exploited with minimal benefits to our First Nation. The Crown, as a user of forest resources, must always be tied to the constitutionally enshrined rights and title of First Nations. No changes in legislation or forest policy should take place outside this paradigm of joint title to the land base.

J. Rustad (Chair): Good. Well, with that, I'll open it up to the committee for questions.

Just a question: when we're looking at some of the set-asides or the reserves, are these areas that you talked about spiritual, archaeological areas that have been identified? From what I understood, you're saying that within some of these reserves we have to be mindful of the fact that there has been a degree of consultation and that within the reserves there are areas that have been set aside for spiritual or archaeological reasons. Is that what I understand?

It's not that you can just go in to a visual-quality or a riparian area without also considering that there are other things that have been, I guess, preserved in that area. Is that part of what's being said here?

C. Leon: Yes, in my trapline just south of here, the Nanna Lake area, there are three gravesites there, which we identified with the community forest. They're aware of it, and they're very respectful in that area.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Okay, so even it there's just limited wood that we might be going after and it's described as a visual-quality area or it's described as a riparian area, also within it there are other values that are simply untouchable as well, that we need to be aware of. I take that point. That's very useful for us.

C. Leon: The Nyan Wheti trail — that's historical, you know. That's known as the old grease trail — back in the 1800s, I guess. That should be funded in that area. So I'd like to make that recommendation to the government — for tourism and stuff. That's so you know that.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Just one question. I don't mean to talk too much here, and I apologize that I don't know this. The various treaty processes that I presume are either ongoing…. I don't know whether there's been a decision to participate in treaty processes, so I have no idea. I apologize for that. But part of what you're saying, I presume, is that if you were involved in the treaty process, that while you go through this you're very mindful of how lands that you have interest in are dealt with. Is that true to say?

First, I guess the question is: are you involved in treaty process, at what stage, and what do we need to be thinking about in terms of what's going on locally as we make decisions on area-based tenure and things like that? That's what we are considering.

C. Leon: The band right now is part of a larger group at the Carrier-Sekani Tribal Council table. That group has decided to suspend any further discussions on treaty matters. That's been going on for the last three years now.

R. Mitchell: There hasn't been anything active going on, but I think one of the points is that Tl'azt'en needs a land base that will generate revenue to support the functioning of its community and the economic benefits for its people. The Crown isn't willing to provide that to First Nations. Although we can see with forest tenure opportunity agreements that there is potential for incrementally achieving that through means other than treaty.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Just one final question, if you don't mind. In terms of if we're talking about access to volumes, is there thinking about whether volume-based tenures are the way that you would be going, or would there be interest in area-based….?

Tl'azt'en has submitted a proposal for an area-based tenure. Tl'azt'en also holds a community forest, and Tl'azt'en also is co-manager of the John Prince Research Forest, co-managing it with the University of Northern British Columbia. So we have infrastructure and expertise that's currently managing these different land bases, and we are proposing a third one so that we can effectively manage on a landscape level, manage for multiple values and also generate revenue to support the nation's operations and functioning.

The Ministry of Forests is constrained in allotting the amount of area that we're requesting.

J. Rustad (Chair): Thank you for that. Just before we go to Bill, I'd just like a bit of a clarification on the area-based question. Obviously, there are many different licences that are out there, and I understand that an area
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base would be effective for the Tl'azt'en First Nation. Are you interested, in terms of the other licensees that are out there, managing on an area basis while perhaps working in relationship with First Nations, as opposed to the current volume-based system?

R. Mitchell: I can't answer that. I'm not the person to speak on that point, only to say that we submitted a proposal for an area-based tenure. It actually requires ministerial approval to extend it beyond the constraints that are currently at the regional level.

J. Rustad (Chair): Thank you. Maybe if I could put that question to you as well, Leonard?

L. Thomas: To clarify that, I think the issue about area-based versus volume-based…. I mean, the volume-based and area-based, basically, are tied together in some form. We would welcome an area-based licence, provided that the volume in that area is sustainable and long term and that we have a sustainable volume included.

So that's basically it. And as far as your question is concerned, with respect to other licensees in specific areas, yeah, we would of course welcome to work with any other licensees working within the area, provided that there's a close business relationship tied with the band.

B. Routley: I just want to follow up on…. What I thought I heard was the suggestion that government was in a conflict of interest. I'm not clear on what you meant by that, but it was very clear that you were recommending that we listen to forest specialists, researchers, scientists. You listed a long group of professionals. Do you have a belief that we're not listening to professionals, or are you emphasizing that there should be a particular interest? This committee should emphasize more what the professionals have to say? This government is using a professional-reliance model right now. Is that what you're suggesting?

R. Mitchell: I was simply recommending that there be sufficient external, objective analysts fueling information and discussion and that the ministry does have an obligation to maintain economic benefit from this resource. That economic component is an important one that you can't ignore, and it's also a component that may interfere with the understanding of the ecological limits of the natural resource.

B. Stewart: I'd like to just — reading through a little bit of what's been presented, I guess…. What are the barriers to reaching economic benefit agreements? You mentioned that there had recently been an economic development agreement that was rejected.

I guess I'm wondering: what are the barriers that First Nations in each of the areas that you represent are finding that haven't been there for you to embrace and be able to get some of the control? You've been asserting or asking that you'd like to have that respect. Part of the whole idea of getting to that is so that there's a benefit agreement and you do get that ability. So what is the barrier for you achieving that?

L. Thomas: Well, I think part of the problem is the way the distribution of the timber licences are in the area. You know, we think that B.C. Timber Sales should be completely cut and that timber should be redistributed either to First Nations or put out there so that we can get access to that.

The other thing, I think, is the major licensees have huge licences, which is good for them at the moment. But I think there should be some movement in terms of the redistribution of those licences — as well as the First Nations that haven't been dealt with through treaty matters, in order to create better relationships so that the bands themselves — including ourselves and the Tl'azt'en and Takla, bands that are within this area — can benefit from that, from those licences, to create an economic, stable relationship within this particular area.

Right now we don't have the benefit of that. The only thing that we can basically look at, I think, in terms of owning licences is that we have to be basically log sellers, and if we can't have that, then we don't really have anything.

R. Mitchell: Yeah, I agree. This area is a pie that's divided into too many pieces, and the only pieces it should be divided into are the local communities and the local people that need the revenue from the forest to support…. Just like Fort St. James needs the forest to support its economic stability, so do the First Nations.

I agree. BCTS — that volume could easily be divided and provided to the First Nations. The licensees that don't have an interest in this area, the ones that are milling in Prince George or in other towns — that volume can stay in the local community and benefit local people.

B. Stewart: Maybe just to follow up on that question, yesterday when we were in Burns Lake, six First Nations there have the Burns Lake economic development group that works and are very active in the partnership with local companies. Is that something that has been explored? Or is it something that there is an opportunity to do more of that between First Nations here and the companies that are on the land base and have been here for some time?

L. Thomas: I think that the last letter our council wrote
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to the minister basically explains that. That's the relationship that I think we need to act on a little further, if there was any appetite for that from the companies.

R. Mitchell: I think that there's lots of potential. And there are a lot of business partnerships currently, with the local licensees.

Well, I just have one other question, as well, following up on that, with what Ben said. When Conifex came in…. Do the First Nations in the area have a partnership with Conifex, and how does that work? Can you describe that?

L. Thomas: Well, I wouldn't call it a partnership. I think we bought some shares in the company. We don't have a seat on their board of directors or anything like that. It's like everybody else. You own a piece of something — right? But we do have a relationship with them that's one that's been better than we had before.

J. Rustad (Chair): I know we're going to have a presentation from Tl'oh in a short while, as well, but what's the relationship with Tl'oh, with the local forestry operations?

J. Rustad (Chair): Thanks. I guess, just to Ben's comment, as well, around the six First Nations working as a group in the Burns Lake area, are you working as a group, as well, in terms of how those opportunities could be explored across the joint traditional territories? Have you explored that kind of an option between Nak'azdli and the Tl'azt'en and Takla Lake band and maybe Yekooche?

L. Thomas: Yeah, we've been exploring all those areas, particularly one of the bioenergy projects that's proposed in this area. Those discussions basically go off and on. When it happens, I believe that all three bands will be involved in that one particular project. As far as Conifex is concerned, there are three bands involved with that as well.

J. Rustad (Chair): I guess a final question is…. One of the things that was raised in Burns Lake, where you have, as you say, wood that isn't allocated or opportunities around the wood…. One of the options that is looked at in the Lakes TSA is for the low-volume wood — wood that's below what's currently considered economical. Of course, that contains a fair amount of biofibre and some potential opportunities there. There was some expression of interest in a licence that was around that, that was focused on an opportunity to be able to participate in a bioeconomy-type of operation, but also, there would be a component of sawlog. Is that something that, as a group of First Nations in this area, you might be interested in exploring?

L. Thomas: We've been exploring all those matters. It's not something that we haven't explored at all. We are always continually looking for opportunities. But up in this area here, even though the opportunity might be there, it's sometimes very difficult to actually get something off the ground, a project off the ground.

R. Mitchell: I think Tl'azt'en is looking for maximizing economic benefits from the forest industry. A lot of these initiatives or ventures — it's kind of a barely-break-even sort of thing. That doesn't leave a lot of leeway for any errors in terms of transportation costs or contractor bids. There is no fat on the bone in these small, little things.

The equity from the forest resource should be divided equally among the First Nations and the local licensees.

J. Rustad (Chair): Thank you very much for spending some time with us. Sorry about the confusion on the start time around this. We very much appreciate your participation in the process.

J. Rustad (Chair): We'll stand for a short recess, and then we will set up for the public input session.

J. Rustad (Chair): Good morning, everyone. We're going to call the meeting of the Special Committee on Timber Supply back to order. We'll start our community input session. This component is designed to be 15 minutes for each presenter. You can arrange how you'd like to use that time, whether you want to just present us with information or be able to provide some opportunity for question-and-answer as well.

With that, I'd like to welcome our first presenters, which would be Greg Stewart and Bruce McLean from the Sinclar — Apollo Forest Products — Group.

G. Stewart: I want to thank the committee for allowing us to have this opportunity to speak today. I am joined by Bruce McLean. Bruce McLean is our senior woods manager for the Sinclar Group Forest Products.

I myself am the president of Sinclar Group Forest Products. Within our group of companies is Apollo
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Forest Products, which is located here in Fort St. James. The comments that you're going to hear from me today are related directly back to Apollo. I am representing Apollo in my presentation.

To provide some background with respect to Apollo, it has been in operation since 1969. The company began its operations with a contract to provide ties to B.C. Rail. It's located ten kilometres northeast of the town, and it's along the Tache highway.

We have an annual allowable cut of 216,000 cubic metres per year. In addition to that, we also manage forest tenures of 100,000 cubic metres for the Ta Da Chun Timber, which is a partnership that we have with Nak'azdli First Nation, which I believe Leonard had referred to in the last presentation.

In addition, in terms of the partnerships that we do have, we've had a long relationship with Nak'azdli. We do have T'loh Forest Products, which is a finger joint facility that is, again, a joint venture with Nak'azdli. T'loh will be discussed later on with Laura Chernowski, the general manager up here, presenting.

We also will manage the Nak'azdli's proposed community forest agreement, so we do have a fair bit of integration there on the forest side. We have two non-replaceable tenures for beetle salvage, amounting to 100,000 cubic metres per year. We also have purchase agreements with the Tl'azt'en First Nation in partnership with Conifex.

The mill itself employs 150 employees. I would like to point out that we did operate continuously through this last recession. Of those employees, approximately 99 percent of them live here in the Fort.

Apollo itself has put approximately $30 million annually into the regional economy. Of that, roughly $20 million ends up in the Fort region. Apollo is very supportive of the Fort St. James region and relies heavily on the community in return for business support, employee housing, schooling, health services, etc.

Although we do have all those cuts, we have moved approximately 100,000 cubic metres per year outside the Fort St. James district to mills in Vanderhoof, Fraser Lake, Prince George, Strathnaver and Quesnel. By moving that volume, it allows us to realize the benefit of those resources coming back into the community from an economic perspective.

Our chips do go to Prince George to the Canfor pulp mills. Half of the shavings that we generate is consumed in our energy system, and the other half is then sold to various pellet producers, including our bark, which is sold abroad as well.

Apollo is part of and supports the Prince George TSA partition committee in the one-year process that identified operating areas under the 2011 P.G. TSA determination. The committee negotiated a temporary redistribution of operating areas in the P.G. TSA to ensure that each company had equal access to priority dead pine stands for salvage.

At this point what I would like to do is go through some of the questions that were identified in the discussion paper in advance of this. We'll just talk about that. I do hope that at the end of this time there will be opportunity for you guys to ask questions of us.

In terms of the values and principles that we think need to be utilized or recognized, first, I think it's important that we technically evaluate the options — whether that be the cost benefit, the social, the environmental. We've also heard of some of the other values that organizations and community groups do prioritize. When you evaluate those options, they should be done for each potential action individually and on the broad scale.

I think it's important that we compare all those potential actions with what is actually occurring today. And I think it's important that when we do come out with proposed actions, we take the time to test those identified actions, to understand how they can be practically implemented. I think it's very easy within some of the policies to come out with a broad statement. The example would be the annual allowable cut being 12 million when, in fact, the harvest level is around the nine million cubic metre level.

I think it's important that through this we recognize that the priority has to be with the pine stands that exist and then, when we look at the constraints, that we take a look and say: "Well, if the priority is pine stands, do those constraints really have the same impact if it's standing dead timber? If it is standing dead pine, is there an opportunity to relax those constraints in those particular areas?"

I think that's where the priority is, and then beyond that I think there has to be broad consultation around whether or not those constraints should continue to exist. I think we heard some discussion earlier today that would suggest there are some other criteria that should be used when evaluating live, green constraint areas.

It's important to us that we continue to respect the current timber supply areas and the determination for those areas that has been provided. It is our opinion that business will continue to determine the level and type of forestry to match the fibre supply volume and the quality required.

In terms of the decision process, I think it's important that we recognize the current processes and plans in place with respect to the various groups that are already doing work in this area: the old-growth working group, the P.G. TSA partition committee, the land and resource management plans, the Omineca Beetle Action Coalition and the mid-term mitigation working group.

We've heard earlier today as well with respect to the use of the expertise, and we would reflect that. I think it's important that we use forest professionals with the expertise and experience in the specific areas for the input that's required. There are people on the ground on a daily
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basis, and we should respect their knowledge and look to incorporate them into the process where possible.

I think it's important that we take the appropriate time to evaluate the options and obtain feedback, which is part of this process today — and which we're very, very supportive of and think that that needs to be incorporated as we go forward.

It has taken many people a lot of time to identify the current constraints. I think we have to respect the knowledge and the work that has gone into those constraints and make sure that we understand the reasoning behind that and the reasons why we would or would not change those constraints, going forward.

It is our opinion that ultimately the chief forester should make the final decision on AAC implications. He has been charged with that mandate, and I think that we have to respect, in this case, his role in making those determinations and working with the various groups and stakeholders.

In terms of the specific area information, I think that just from the brief background I did give you about Apollo, we very much see ourselves as a community-based business, and we continue to try and support the community stakeholders. Based on our relationship at Tl'oh and with Ta Da Chun and the recent agreement that we reached with Tl'azt'en, I think it shows that we regard and highly respect First Nations as an integral part of this community. As such, I think we have to be prepared to work with and support their initiatives, going forward.

I would also add that a lot of this is going to be governed by economics, and the challenge that we have is making sure that we can access some of these stands economically. You will see situations where companies may not be accessing pine-leading stands because economically it doesn't make sense for them to do that.

One of the ways that you can enhance the economic benefits of a particular stand is to take a look at the infrastructure. I think Fort St. James's infrastructure does require some work. I know there have been previous discussions about this. But the infrastructure in and out of town needs upgrades such as surfacing, brushing, lighting, pedestrian walkways and crosswalks, and bridge upgrades due to extra truck volume due to harvesting and even to the Mount Milligan project.

I think that's of interest to the community as well as of interest to the companies that are working in this area — to ensure that they can minimize the logistic costs.

In terms of cautions and advice that was asked for, first and foremost, we believe that the TSAs, as they exist today, need to be maintained the way they are and kept intact. I think the recommendations should be confined to land base constraints within the TSA and should recognize that business decisions will ultimately determine the most economical wood flow.

As I mentioned before, we are moving wood out of Fort St. James, and that's due to economics. That allows us to access more fibre today than we would have economically been able to access prior to reaching those agreements with these other companies.

I think it's important that we need to evaluate what will be remaining for industry located in Fort St. James after beetle salvage is completed. Our concern would be: what do those stands look like, and are they going to be economical for the mill to continue to operate at the levels that it's operating at?

Moving logs towards chip and residual markets is more efficient than the reverse. We believe strongly that pine-stand conversion should continue to be a top priority before stands hit the shelf-life expiry date. It needs to be pointed out that the shelf life does vary based on locations.

Communities and businesses need a predictable fibre availability process in the future that incorporates forest management plans and timber supply updates and supports replaceable tenures. The crux of that is that we need to make sure that those processes are dynamic and can respond to the changing conditions that we see on the land base.

In terms of the engagement, it's important that we utilize the Prince George TSA partitioning committee for input and feedback. They've been working on this challenge for over a year now, and I think it's important that we leverage that knowledge and expertise and discussions they have had to make sure that it all gets factored in.

It's important that we include the community of Fort St. James in reviewing these recommendations and ensure that public and stakeholders have opportunity for review and feedback on recommendations and implementation proposals. As we've heard today, from the First Nations presentations as well as the community, there's a lot at stake here, and I think engaging those stakeholders today will reap benefits for us for years to come.

With that, I'll conclude the presentation. I will let you know that we will be submitting a written submission for this, so you'll have a bit more detail behind some of this stuff I have provided already.

J. Rustad (Chair): Thanks, I appreciate that. I've got a number of questions as well, but I'll start off with the other committee members.

E. Foster: Thank you, gentlemen, for your presentation. What percentage of your profile is pine?
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E. Foster: Okay, so you're saying that what you're harvesting is 70 percent. Of your chart area, what percentage would be pine?

B. McLean: Our area would have less pine than that, but under the partition, we're required and we are focusing on predominantly pine.

E. Foster: No. Okay, yeah, I get that. The question — right? — is how…. I guess what I'm getting to is: where are you going to be at the end, when the pine salvage is done? You feel comfortable that the surviving pine and the spruce and balsam will be able to carry you through?

G. Stewart: I'll comment on it, and I'll turn it over to Bruce to probably correct me.

I would not describe us by saying we're comfortable today. I think we're going to have to take a look in terms of what the mitigation strategies are that are deployed to deal with the eventual clawback of the AAC. What does that mean for our operations, and how much of that fibre is available for us once the pine mitigation strategies have been implemented?

B. McLean: Yeah, just to add to that. There's one thing that the volume may be there — and it's going to be far less pine, obviously — but it's the economics of where the volume is and what it takes to get there and what constraints are required. So that's something that everybody has to deal with, and that's something that's a bit unknown, because Prince George TSA is very big. The Fort St. James is just one part of it.

You know, everybody is coming into the Fort to focus properly on the pine, but our concern is: what are the profile and the economics going to look like come mid-term? Basically, the most economical pine stands are being removed now, and coupled with that, there's a certain amount of green. That's something that we have to do before we can evaluate for capital improvements and stuff like that. So that is a concern.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Just very quickly. Thanks for the presentation. You had talked about getting into stands that are currently inoperable before the shelf life of the pine goes. One of the suggestions you had, and I don't know if it's connected directly to that, is just that the government invest in infrastructure and things like that.

Do you have any other things that the government could do to assist in getting that pine before it completely goes? Are there forest health initiatives or other things that could also have the benefit of making that fibre available before it's gone?

G. Stewart: I'll certainly give my initial reaction on it, and then I will let Bruce talk a little bit more specifically on some of those other details.

I think that there are options. I think we have to be very careful around how we would implement that because of the softwood lumber agreement. I'm a big proponent of bioenergy and the opportunity to develop and grow that industry, and how you can innovatively put policy in place that would encourage that type of development. I think that that will help in terms of being able to expand the economic stands that are available.

B. McLean: No. You know, we support what the town presented this morning as far as opportunities. I think it's important that…. We're not going to address all the pine stands. Whether they're going to be able to continue to grow fibre — that would be a focus of government to convert stands that clearly are already starting to deteriorate, are not economical.

To get those growing is a priority. I mean, it's huge funding, and how you do that is going to be a difficult decision. Certainly, any area that becomes non-growing and the fibre is not economical — it's just dead ground — is not contributing. So I think that is a priority.

J. Rustad (Chair): Okay, thanks. I've got a couple questions too, but I'll go to Bill first.

B. Routley: A couple of questions. Are you certified as one of the many groups that do certification of forest products? If you could tell us a little bit about that.

The second question is about the presentation that we heard this morning from the district of Fort St. James. It talked about Crown's recognition of the negative value of some timber. Obviously, that's dealing with the same issue Norm talked about — the cost of accessing timber that currently isn't economically viable. I'd like to hear if you have any other ideas on what could be done about that.

As far as uneconomical stands or negative…. That's something all licensees face. Some of the suggestions earlier this morning about amalgamating cutting permits, notwithstanding it doesn't trigger SLA issues and stuff like that, and being able, for example, if we have to build
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a road or something, to amortize that over a bigger volume as opposed to one specific cutting permit — I think there are some short-term things like that.

Long term, if it's uneconomical because of access, we certainly…. You know, access just isn't for timber. It could be for exploration or other things. So it becomes a resource road issue, and I think government would help us quite a bit if they helped in that kind of major access development.

G. Stewart: The one thing I would add is that I think in this region you're going to find that most of them are CSA- or SFI-approved. I would also recommend that the committee keep FSC certification front and centre as well, as there is a growing push to move towards FSC certification. Granted, today that's not a possibility, but I think that that should be in the front of the committee's mind.

J. Rustad (Chair): Unfortunately, we're out of time. I've got a number of questions. Harry has a question as well. So I just want to confirm: are you going to be presenting again at one of our other community meetings or at the provincial opportunity, or are you just going to give us a written submission?

G. Stewart: I will be presenting again tomorrow, as I represent Lakeland at that session, and then we will also be providing that written submission.

Maybe a couple of questions to think about — you don't have to answer now because we're out of time — particularly around Apollo. What's the total cut that you're harvesting, or what are you actually sawing today? How many cubic metres?

J. Rustad (Chair): About 500,000. Okay, so you've got about 40 percent or thereabouts under a renewable licence.

Then, are you cutting any stands under the current utilization level that contributes to the AAC in the Prince George area? So I think 180,000 cubic metres per hectare. Are you harvesting in stands below that today?

J. Rustad (Chair): Something to perhaps think about in terms of that, because that's obviously an issue that we need to think about. Some other companies have said that they are. So that and also a discussion around area base, but we'll save that for the next opportunity.

T. Greenaway: Thank you very much. It's a real pleasure to have you here today. It's good to see you come out and meet with the community. I'm the director of the electoral area C within the regional district of Bulkley-Nechako. I represent the area around Fort St. James here.

I'm very short here, but I just have a comment. I'm not an expert in the forest industry, so I'm not going to go there, but I do have a comment to make here. Reducing restrictions to allow harvesting in reserve areas, wildlife habitat areas and visual sensitive areas will not amount to a significant amount of wood volume increase.

Changing regulations which reduce restrictions on harvesting in sensitive areas will not make a significant change in the mid-term timber supply but will expose licensees to a new set of issues. These issues include potential negative impacts to fish and wildlife, impacting licensees' ability to meet their ISO certification and ability to access European and U.S. markets where environmental standards are required to conduct business.

These proposed practices would lower the public opinion of the environmental standards in the B.C. forest industry. Three-quarters of B.C.'s population live in cities and gather their opinions of forest stewardship from Greenpeace and other environmental advocacy groups. If these groups feel that we are poor stewards of the forest, it would shut down the industry. We have demonstrated our ability to be good stewards of the land, and the last thing we should be doing is allowing our standards to come into question.

B. Routley: Yes, we heard the last presenter also talk about moving towards FSC certification, which has got a tighter chain-of-command requirement and certainly influences the marketplace. So I totally understand your point, particularly given that our province is currently relying on a professional reliance model and the certifying bodies have obviously been comfortable in certifying these companies based on the existing legislation and the model, including the land use plans as they exist. So any changes could trigger some action.

Are you aware, one way or the other…? These certifying bodies — I would like to know if they're actually paying attention to what's going on here with this committee. It's one of the groups that we'd actually like to hear from, one way or the other, in terms of their view on some of
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the proposals that have been presented to this committee.

I don't know if you have any connections to any of those committees, but maybe you should let them know that we'd like to hear from them.

T. Greenaway: Right. I just know…. If you look back, say a dozen years ago, we were having all the protestors out there protesting what we were doing with a lot of our logging practices. That's all gone away, and I'd sure hate to see that come back.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Well, if it gives you any comfort, in each of the communities that we've gone into…. These are communities that, like this one, know the trade-offs that come with resource industries, but in each and every community, whether it's industry groups or community groups, that same caution has been given to us — that we have a balance, that there are a multitude of values that need to be protected, and that we have earned a good name internationally that we need to be careful to retain.

When we first sat as a committee, each of us did sort of our war stories: we were in local government, or we remember the war in the woods, we remember what happens when you lose your international reputation. That's not a place that, I think I can speak for everyone here, we would entertain going back to.

So certainly your words of caution…. I mean, we've heard today and we've heard it repeatedly that we have the potential to misstep and make things a lot worse, and that's not something that we can do.

Thank you for this and for your words of what is essentially caution in terms of how we move forward.

D. Barnett: Thank you for your presentation. You know, I come from the heart of the beetle country, the Cariboo Chilcotin, and it is very rewarding to come to small communities in British Columbia and hear your presentations. You will find that most of the conflict comes from the bigger places. In your small communities you understand, you know the issues, and you know the ramifications of the decisions that are made today.

So I thank you for your honest and open presentations. Those of us here at the table — some of us have great experience in the war in the woods, as MLA Macdonald said, land use plans, and now of course this issue. Thank you so much for your honest, open presentations.

B. Stewart: Thanks, Tom. I appreciate your comments. What I think we did here from some of the communities that is different than when the war in the woods was taking place is that the forests were much different places than they are today. Prior to the pine beetle, I mean, setting aside these areas that we're discussing, it was seen to be a natural and reasonable approach.

Today a lot of the communities are suggesting that these places are not healthy places and that the visual-quality objectives and some of these things that you see, even coming into Fort St. James, are places where maybe there should be a different approach looked at.

My question in that light is: have you been seeing or hearing from these people that were here a dozen years ago? Are they regularly coming in, and what's the perspective, if you have one, from the people that were protesting a dozen years ago and how they see the woods today? Because of course with the increased annual allowable cut, I'm sure that if we were doing that type of cutting the way that we're having to do it with pine beetle wood, they'd probably have something to say about it. There seems to be a level of acceptance that they know that the epidemic has been through here and, really, harvesting makes some sense.

T. Greenaway: As far as the visual quality is concerned there, if you got even into a riparian area, any of these sensitive areas, if it's dead pine, then yes, I'm quite in favour of having a good look at it if it's safe to go ahead and do it. But if it's in these good riparian areas, if it's good green wood, then we should be following our rules and regulations that we've set in place here.

B. Stewart: So you don't have any feedback from these people that may have been here doing the things they were doing a dozen years ago? It's something we're bound to hear of, but I think that, to Norm's point, we want to hear from them, because I think that we realize we're all in this together, whether it's the government, the local community, the logging, the forest industry and the NGOs that really advocate that we do do some of those things.

But today, going ahead, what do we do in those areas where there are completely dead stands of pine along those riparian areas — or not just riparian but visual-quality corridors and the old-growth forest, or dead old-growth forest, as we heard yesterday? I think that what we want to do is try to find the solution to keep communities healthy and rebuild these forests the way that everybody expects them to be.

J. Rustad (Chair): Tom, I've just got a couple of quick questions as well, if you don't mind. I've got a couple of minutes left.

There was a resolution that came forward from the
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North Central Local Government Association that was discussed and supported unanimously — and ultimately supported unanimously at UBCM — which was to look at the constraints, in particular the visual-quality constraints, on the land base, and to look at the possibility of relaxing them.

That was a motion that came forward from this region that was driven out of this region. So are you saying that we should not be doing that now or we shouldn't be looking at that particular motion?

T. Greenaway: No. That's a very big picture. That can be interpreted in lots of different ways. Like I mentioned a little bit earlier, if you look at dropping some of those restraints in what has previously been visual-restraint areas and if it's got dead pine in it, then if it's okay to go into it, fine. Go ahead and go into it. But if it's visual restraint on some of our beautiful lakes and rivers that we have around here, then let's stay out of there.

J. Rustad (Chair): The second thing. As you know, the impact to the Prince George supply area…. We're currently harvesting just around ten million cubic metres a year, I'm told from the Ministry of Forests staff. The preharvest was just over nine million, and we're projected to go down to just over six million. That would have a significant impact throughout the whole area, and our committee is being asked to look at ways of trying to mitigate that.

Are you suggesting through this that we should not be looking at any options or just that we should not be looking at the constraints?

T. Greenaway: I'm suggesting that we should leave something for our grandchildren, that there's something out there for them too. I lived in this community, the basic area, for 40 years. I've raised my children here, and they've been able to do quite well making a living here in this area, and I want to see my grandchildren have that chance.

J. Rustad (Chair): So if we came forward, and I…. Sorry, I thank you for that, but I just want to be clear in terms of what you're trying to say to us here. If we came forward with options that are sustainable throughout the mid-term and into the long term and that would have a timber flow that went through that, you'd be comfortable with that, if there were options that could expand the timber supply? Or are you suggesting that we should not consider any options and keep the status quo?

T. Greenaway: What I'm saying is that we want to make sure that there is wood there for the smaller communities like Fort St. James in 20 years' time, 30 years' time. This area was built on the forest industry, and like I say, it should be here in 20 and 30 years' time or 40 years' time.

J. Rustad (Chair): Not sure if you quite answered the question, but that's okay. Thank you very much for your presentation, Tom.

My name is Laura Chernowski, and I'm here as the general manager of Tl'oh Forest Products and Ta Da Chun Timber. Thank you for the opportunity to speak this morning.

A little bit of background. Nak’azdli First Nations came up with a venture idea and successfully negotiated with Apollo Forest Products, one of the Sinclar Group, to form Tl'oh Forest Products. It's a limited partnership, and we commenced operations in 1995. Within a short time the business model became finger-jointing, and that remains the core business today.

In 2002 we created Ta Da Chun Timber. It was our secondary remanning line, and it was done in conjunction with a forest licence under section 21 licence criteria for about 100,000 cubic metres, which is managed by Apollo Forest Products. If we have any specific timber questions, I will defer them to Mike and crew.

Tl'oh is overseen by a board of directors represented by both ownerships — that is Nak’azdli and Apollo, or Sinclar. The plant is located on the Nak’azdli reserve, which in itself sits directly next to the community of Fort St. James.

The objectives of Nak’azdli for the partnership were to enhance the First Nations participation in the forestry manufacturing side and to build capacity and access to First Nations workforce. Apollo sought to enhance First Nations relationships, gain access to fibre and diversification in product offering. It is to these two ends that Tl'oh and Ta Da Chun represent a successful venture between industry and First Nations.

We currently employ approximately 50 employees, 85 percent of which are status, or First Nations. We all live in the local community, and as such we rely on the local services.

We have and are in the process of successfully training locals in millwrighting, electrical trades. We are investing in technology and increasing the capacity of our workforce. We work with Nak’azdli and CNC to provide essential skills training to prepare our workforce for upcoming opportunities, including technological advancements.

We are using our forest licence to negotiate material for our plant. As such, we work closely with the local li-
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censees, Apollo and Conifex, as our success is tied much to theirs. We have plans underway for new business ventures and additional employment.

So responding to some of the requests from the committee. With regards to the values and principles for guidance, we ask that you understand that there are multiple users and the net effect on the land base. What are the social, economic and environmental consequences? What is the impact, the long-term impact for this district and the industry proponents who support the small communities and, as such, the local infrastructure?

In the decision process, please continue to stay tuned to the local communities, the local businesses, the municipalities and the First Nations — those of us with vested interests.

In terms of specific area information, First Nations are part of this community and the business community. Accelerating the harvesting will have implications on our local facilities and jeopardize complementary business plans such as our plant and other spinoffs.

We need improvements in our local infrastructure, as the level of investment is far exceeded by the value of resources removed from our district — the roads, and specifically the North Road, being a great example. Visual aspects are important to the people in our workplace and are a big selling feature of our district.

Cautions and advice. Short-term changes will have long-term implications on our community. I think we've heard that a little bit here today. We need our industry players to be able to understand where the mid- and long-term supply is in order to continue to make plans and invest. We need to know where we're going and what those opportunities will be. New business will drive wood consumption, and it recognizes that business decisions will ultimately determine the most economical wood flow.

In terms of engagement, continue to provide these opportunities to all stakeholders to participate in reviewing and the ability to provide feedback. That's huge, and we thank you for it.

J. Rustad (Chair): Laura, much appreciated. I'll look to questions from members.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Of the AAC you have available, does that all flow to Apollo? Or do you use that with other mills, as well, to get reman material? How does that work?

L. Chernowski: What I omitted out of there, too, is that it's actually a NRFL, so it's non-replaceable. Apollo administers it, and we're actually in the process of leveraging that for other supply.

L. Chernowski: We get it from Conifex, from Apollo, recently from the Hampton Babine plant and West Fraser — wherever we can get it.

B. Stewart: Thanks very much, Laura, for an interesting presentation. You mentioned finger-jointing, and of course my mind immediately jumps to value-add, and you're utilizing fibre that obviously doesn't fit certain dimensions that other people are doing. Where does the fibre…? What type of fibre are you using for your plant? What meets the criteria of your operation?

L. Chernowski: We're taking trim end from the primary mills, both stud and dimension facilities — dimensions from 2-by-4 to 2-by-12 — and we reman that into 2-by-3 to 2-by-6. So whatever they're running basically becomes part of our fibre basket.

B. Routley: I guess my question was about the plans for additional jobs, and I might add that I would certainly commend the partnership that's occurred here. I think it's wonderful to see the kind of jobs that have been created with First Nations and the kind of win-win that comes out of the activities that have taken place here.

I might add that the number of jobs per cubic metre is actually quite impressive when you look at the actual volume that you're harvesting. If I have my math correct, we've got 150 jobs with the company, with Apollo, and another 50 jobs with the finger-jointing plant. That's impressive indeed, given the AAC that you're dealing with. If there were rewards for jobs per cubic metre, I'd be looking to put you on the list.

Anyway, on the additional jobs that you're looking at, could you give us some idea of what that might be about, or is that a secret?

L. Chernowski: Part of it's a secret, but it's certainly not a secret that within our group we believe that there's a great opportunity coming on the bioenergy side. So we are part of that value stream, and we're trying to balance not giving away what is our fibre right now and making sure that we're using — what do you say? — correct opportunities for our residuals. Maybe there's an opportunity to augment those with some of the fibre that's available in the bush, but the bioenergy sector is certainly
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something that will eventually stick.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Yeah. I have two actually, really quickly, just on the skills training. You highlighted some skills training that you're doing. What programs have been useful there? Or is this something that's purely an initiative of the businesses involved?

L. Chernowski: We have had some folks, grass roots from our organization, go through the certified trades. Lately we've been noticing the gap in terms of people's ability to kind of reach into those greater technological positions and maybe even to the supervisory realms, and certainly into the management realm — so working with CNC and Nak'azdli to provide essential skills in terms of — what would you say? — upgrading of our basic reading, writing and arithmetic, and then into some business training to provide them the opportunity to take some of those other job opportunities.

N. Macdonald (Deputy Chair): Just with the bioenergy, are we looking at an IPP selling into B.C. Hydro — that sort of a project — or are we looking at community heating projects? What are some of the things that are being talked about?

I guess, also, I'm not sure what the interface fuel management for the community is, but does that tie into any of the plans as well, to try to deal with some of the interface fuel management issues at the same time as some of these energy projects?

L. Chernowski: That's a big wow, having been at the bioconference last week, and certainly the opportunities abound. But one of the things I took away from that is starting at a slightly smaller scale and then working out to involving the community. Ideally, we'd like to look at something in the community heat aspect within our local community. We're a small plant, so basing that around our residual output and then gradually building onto something bigger and better, I think, is what the community would like to see.

J. Rustad (Chair): I've just got a couple of quick questions as well. First of all, thank you for presenting for us and telling us about the operation. It's great to hear about the value-added component that's in there.

J. Rustad (Chair): In seven years. Okay. That NRFL — is that targeted as part of the pine uplift, or has that got any other components of it?

L. Chernowski: It was section 21 in 2002, so it was to do with advancement of remanufacturing.

J. Rustad (Chair): Okay. I guess the last component to that is…. If there is a falldown, or when there is a falldown, and if we don't make any decisions, there's a reasonable chance that there may be a number of mills that go down throughout the Prince George area. Hopefully, that'll be minimal. But what capacity are you at in terms of the supply of blocks that you have today from those mills? So in other words, are you at capacity? Can you get more blocks than you need, or do you need to find more blocks? What happens if that becomes a little bit more constrained?

L. Chernowski: Our game is so contingent on what the primaries are doing and predicted by the market. Right now we're flush. That wasn't the case six months ago. It certainly wasn't in the period 2007 through 2010, where fibre was a shortage. Absolutely a concern — losing more primary facilities in this region. Again, we went all the way out to Burns Lake and into Prince George. It's normally been kind of our fibre grab. Any changes in that change the whole opportunity for our reman sector.

J. Rustad (Chair): How much of that fibre were you sourcing out of Hampton, out of Babine Forest Products?

L. Chernowski: We took all of their trim when their kind of associated finger joint plant was not running. They also have an alliance with First Nations up there, and they operated a finger joint plant as well.

H. Bains: Quick question, just a follow-up on that. As you noticed, and I have experienced in speaking to many remanufacturers and value-added operators, the raw material sometimes can be always a challenge to secure.

You mention a number of different sources and that the cooperation that you have within Fort St. James is very good. You mentioned Babine; there was some product coming from there. How has that affected since that mill burned down, and were you able to compensate or augment that from somewhere else? Is that a challenge now that you're facing, or is that…?

L. Chernowski: A few different things happened at that time. One of our other suppliers picked up a shift. There was a market change that allowed some of our other suppliers to change their trim schedules, so that provided
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an uplift. Then, of recent, actually, Babine has been running their facility — the planer — so running out the rough stock. Today our fibre supply is good. Two months down the road, we're back into the acquisition mode.

J. Rustad (Chair): Laura, thank you very much for your presentation, taking some time to let us know about your story.

Our next presenter is Elke Lepka, with the Takla Lake First Nation. Now, I understand that Dolly was hoping to be here.

Thank you for being able to make it down and spend some time with us. I will turn it over to you.

E. Lepka: Thank you, and I'd like to thank, first of all and foremost, the Nak'azdli for allowing us to be here today.

We're Takla Lake First Nation. We are a remote community located on Takla Lake, 200 kilometres north of Fort St. James. Currently we have no forest economies in our nation. The only small bit would be over in the Mackenzie area. That's more capitalizing with industry.

We have a population of approximately 1,300 people. The Takla reserve now only accommodates approximately 200 people due to the economic downturn and Canfor not being able to make moneys within our traditional territories. They were one of the main licensees in our area that provided spinoff effects for Takla.

We used to have a couple of logging companies. They have since gone bankrupt. We have a lot of skilled-labour First Nations that know how to operate machinery, environmental monitoring, and that sort of thing. However, Takla continues to find it impossible to create and make economics in our nation while upstanding our traditional values of environmental and wildlife integrity.

At this time we are looking into other opportunity areas. We don't see the forest just as a crop tree base. We do see it as an ecosystem that provides many more value-added products than a sawlog which makes 2-by-4s.

First Nations are very keen in identifying historical and traditional values and management practices that have been used in the past that we do not see today. We do view the legislative system that we have today as a mismanagement practice. We're not too inclined on planting trees. You've taken away one of the best management practices, which is fire. We face many barriers today because of our custom values that really dictate how the land should be managed.

This is also including cumulative impacts. We're not only faced with forestry issues; we're faced with mining issues, oil and gas issues, transmission lines. Pretty much selling all our raw resources to Asia so they can sell it back to us, double the price.

We are not in treaty. We've opted out of treaty for now. We don't believe it's fair that $20 million versus $2 million to fight a treaty battle is substantial. The FROs and the new FCRSAs that have been presented to us are not viable. The timber tenures that we have been offered though these FROs are not even close to feasible because of our location — a stump-to-dump type of deal — and because of the revenue-sharing aspect that would be coming back to the nation, which is 3 percent of a portion of the revenues taken by the province.

We are opposed to fertilizers or any unnatural real state of revitalizing the forest. We don't believe it should be managed on a crop tree base. We see very many value-added products that can come out of there and that can stay locally in these communities.

We continue to watch our timber flow out, and nothing comes back, even to these local communities here. We have high risk of suicide, crime rates. This all leads to not having the resources to deal with these people because our resources are leaving our areas.

The people on the ground that we respect as our elders…. Their knowledge has not been incorporated into legislation. We begin to hear the words "shared decision-making," yet we still continue to fall by the wayside. Signing on to FROs has done nothing much for our community. As I said, the Crown does not have any more timber to give out because it's all allocated by large licensees.

It's great that we have a good international name, but when you live here and you're local, we don't view that as a quality thing to have. Local information is quality. Quantity is not the answer. We see very many value-added aspects — as environmental monitoring, medicinal uses, other fibre uses — yet we continue to fall by the wayside of being heard. We were at round tables. We've been in the FROs and the FRAs for the last ten to 12 years.

We've always continued to be promised that we were going to get timber tenure, yet the nation has signed three of these. We have still not had a timber tenure that's viable. We did receive one back in 2000, with a former chief. However, this actually had to be reallocated to the Prince George area due to the stump to dump — the inability to sell this fibre to mills.

We operate not only in the Fort St. James district; we operate in the Mackenzie district. We are building great relationships with our neighbouring First Nations, and they share the same values that we do.

There is no real baseline data collected by the province to determine what is out there and how it's going to look, long term. It's more of: "Get in there, get the fibre out, and keep on going." We've been operating as we'd done in the '80s and the '70s. We are in the 21st century today, and we do not agree with the unsustainable management
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practices that legislation has put forward.

D. Abraham: I am Chief Dolly Abraham from Takla Lake First Nation. I wasn't exactly prepared to speak, but I will speak. Back in 2005 I became Chief of Takla, and since then I have been the Chief. Back then I saw there were logs, about 200 trainloads of cars of logs leaving my community.

We did an analysis of what had come out of our community, and that analysis was taken out of the Ministry of Forests records. It was $955 million. None of that came back into the community — not one penny of it. Maybe a few people made some money, but the band, our people, still live…. Our people are like 80 percent unemployed right now.

If you looked around the First Nations community, you would see a lot of people, a lot of First Nations, that have housing poverty, unemployed people, and that is the way it is. If anything, I think the P.G. TSA — A, B and C — is Takla territory, Nak'azdli and Tl'azt'en territory. This is the only First Nation that has wood in the whole of B.C., I believe, right now, and this is where everybody is looking — at our area.

We deal with Mackenzie, Ministry of Forests, where the referrals are coming in. We deal with the Ministry of Forests in Fort St. James. The referrals are coming in. Then you go to Skeena River on the other side, and the referrals. If you look at it, and then you put it all together, there will be nothing left. We will have nothing.

I think if you really want the companies behind me, that are sitting back here, for economic development and the value of it, well, there has to be a way that everybody could win in a way.

There has to be a way that you could do stuff to create more jobs, cut out the machinery work and do it properly. There should be selection logging. There is a lot of mountain pine beetle out there. There's no doubt about that. Look at it. It's red. It's going further up north. We have a lot of green wood — I could say that — but still the pine beetle epidemic is going further up north. I mean, there's a way that I think if the companies, First Nations people input….

You know, in 2005 and 2006 — or 2007 — Pat Bell was the Minister of Forests. He promised land use planning to our people. From this day forward, I have not seen one dime for land use planning. Our people protect their area where there are burial grounds, medicinal plants that they use. We still live off this land here. This land is really not for sale to anyone.

We should have a fair say in what happens to our land out here. We should have total…or, at least, land management put in place. This so-called Special Committee on Timber Supply — we should be part of this. Nobody invited myself, as Chief. I don't even know about the Chief of Tl'azt'en or any First Nations chief that got invited to sit on this committee and say: "Well, which part of this land is going to be impacted by forestry companies?"

They put a road ban on our community. It's supposed to be still on, but yet I go by, coming down, and there's so much equipment going up. Is that supposed to be a road ban? To me, I think it's just really unfair. I mean, I'm all for economics here for my people. I'm all for having a fair say. Where is our fair say in the FRO, saying that we're going to get tenure? You give us 125,000 cubic metres. What is that supposed to do? What is that supposed to employ? How many people?

There should be a way that…. If this timber supply review was supposed to manage whatever is left of the timber that is up north here and whichever companies are trying to do work here, well, do it properly, and leave some. You don't have to clear-cut right up to the lake and contaminate most of the sites.

There's a lot of stuff in Takla where in 1970 — whenever the road first went through — a lot of blocks got cut, but there was nothing ever brushed out. The blocks weren't looked after. It was just forgotten. It grew back by itself, but it was never brushed out or anything. We have companies to do that. It seems like most of the time they say: "Well, your people are not educated enough. They don't have the certificate to run machines." Well, they don't need the certificate. They could run the machines.

I think that in my community…. I really would want a say as to what goes on in my community, because right now I'm faced with three Ministry of Forests districts around me. All the referrals that I have right now are clearcutting right around the whole territory, which is 27,000 miles. That's going right from — let's see — about 16 kilometres right up to Bear Lake and then right up to Mackenzie, right down to close to Babine.

So there is a lot of destruction, and it's not really fair to my people. If anything needs to happen, I think that First Nations people need to do our land use planning first. We need to have a say into what happens on our land, because it is affecting our people. They still live off this land.

We're not only looking at that now. We're also starting to have these pipelines going through, natural gas pipelines and B.C. Hydro transmission. We have a CN rail line going up there. But when it comes right down to fixing our roads up and having an escape route for my people, nobody wants to put a dime on the table to say: "Well, here. Here's some money. Go fix that road so your people could get out safely." We're just being ignored, more like.

Elke said pretty well everything on the economic side of it, but I'm saying it right now because, you know, I protected my territory for a long time. I was not a chief when I started, but I saw the unfairness going to my community and my people still living in poverty.

Right now we're fighting for houses. We're fighting for a new school. Students got moved out of the school be-
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cause it was condemned by Health Canada. There again, you look at the $955 million that went out of Takla's territory. Where is the revenue-sharing that's supposed to come back there? Where is the revenue-sharing that's supposed to hit 2008 at the Mackenzie site?

There is no such thing. Yet it's a big dream that people keep saying. Prove it if there's revenue-sharing somewhere. This FRO deal…. I don't even know if it…. It just doesn't even work. We were told: "You sign this FRO, and then you'll get some timber supply or whatever, timber tenure." If you look at it the way I look at it, it would not work.

You look at the people back here. Some of them are companies behind me that are trying to do work. Look at it the way I'm looking at it right now. If you want to create employment for the whole of Fort St. James using our land as First Nations people, do it right. Don't clearcut — right? There is selection logging. There is a way to create jobs for everyone.

E. Lepka: So just to reiterate, what Chief Abraham has said is that we don't have any jobs. It's gone. We are viewed as people that live in poverty. Most of our members have to move to Prince George to create their own economies or take a lesser-wage job so that they can keep their families fed. That increases their bills as well, whereas we're living on the land here.

We're able to provide sustenance to our people. We do have cultural models. We do have sustenance models. We are aware of cumulative impacts and water integrity.

We recommend honouring those commitments that the province has made to us with First Nation land use planning, First Nation management practices, true shared decision-making, implementing the New Relationship Trust Act, avenues to support Interior communities and value-added sector.

Right now B.C. is selling everything offshore and getting nothing in return, or pennies in return. Even pennies are worth something nowadays.

J. Rustad (Chair): Thank you very much for the presentation. Unfortunately we don't have time for questions from members, but I really do appreciate that you've taken some time to share with us your perspective and views. I think it's important, and I'm glad we were able to have the opportunity.

D. Abraham: I think I would like this committee to really think hard of the First Nations' interests, that we still reside and live off this land, and we have never surrendered our land to anyone. Before any companies or any blocks go out on the maps or out for tenure, you need to consult with us first.

J. Rustad (Chair): Chief Abraham, Councillor Lepka, thank you very much for your presentation.

Our next presenter will be Blair Mayes and Doug Perdue from Dunkley Lumber. Blair, over to you.

B. Mayes: Thank you very much. My name is Blair Mayes. I'm the business development advisor at Dunkley Lumber, and Doug Perdue is chief forester for Dunkley Lumber.

First of all, to the committee, we would like to say that we intend to make a more formal presentation at another session. We had anticipated that you might have had a very full agenda here today with other groups. So recognizing that Kate was able to slot us in for a brief presentation, we thought what our focus would be is simply providing you with some information about our company as well as providing you with some of our answers to the four or five questions that you ask in your discussion paper.

We'd like to start off, though, by thanking you. I think we'd like to thank the committee in several ways. First of all, thank you for coming to the communities. I think it is a very sound and a very logical approach you've taken. It may be a nightmare for Hansard Services to have kept up and/or your BlackBerrys to have kept us with you. But to have presented the communities with an opportunity for everyone to try to get in to say something is much better than having set up in Vancouver and having the communities come to you.

We'd also like to thank you for tackling this issue. This could make you famous or infamous, but nonetheless this subject is overdue, actually, but extremely timely that it be addressed now.

Also, we would like to thank you for tackling this in a non-partisan way. At the end of the day this is all about the people of the province and the resources of our province, and I would compliment you. I'd expected to see a few more political digs, but I compliment you on the non-partisan nature and I hope that when you make your recommendations and formulate your final report that it, too, can be delivered in a sound, non-partisan way. So thank you very much.

Let me tell you a quick bit about Dunkley Lumber. We have one sawmill. We've been family-owned since 1953, so we're in our 59th year of operation. We like to say that Prince George is located about 80 kilometres north of Dunkley, and Quesnel is located about 45 kilometres south of Dunkley. We employ about 275 people, and when we're at what we would call our full production we produce somewhere between 500 million and 600 million board feet.

I believe we are one of the largest individual sawmill sites in the province. Our consumption is in the range of
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1.8 million to 1.9 million cubic metres. With that level of consumption, we only have approximately 20 percent of our wood supply in secured tenure.

We have a tree farm licence, an area-based tree farm licence 53, which provides us with about 190,000 cubic metres. We have one forest licence, which was the former Stuart Lake Lumber licence here in Fort St. James, which we acquired about three to four years ago, with an allowable cut of just slightly over 200,000 cubic metres.

So we have 20 percent secured. The other 80 percent we acquire by trades and purchases of logs. We're probably one of the biggest purchasers in this zone of the Interior. We purchase logs from community forests, woodlots, other licensees, B.C. Timber Sales, true privates, First Nations tenures and anybody else that has a tree that would like to sell it.

We do bring maybe a little different twist to some of the questions and some of the comments that have been supplied to the committee.

You asked in your first question: what values and principles should guide the evaluation and decision-making regarding mitigation of timber supply?

Our point is that sound forest management is actually accomplished by managing for both timber and non-timber values. We use the word "constraints," but in reality, those constraints should be more correctly termed as strategies, and we use those strategies to manage for the non-timber value.

While we certainly don't want to confuse the public or anyone else that's involved, I think that constraints…. We've matured as an industry now, where we don't view them as constraints. We view them as strategies. We have to employ them as we manage our forests, because we know, as has been pointed out, we are responsible for the management of all resources, not simply timber, even though we are a timber-producing company.

We've had a catastrophic event, and, as a result, both timber and non-timber values have been impacted. These impacts have to be distributed — and this is a role of your committee — across both timber and non-timber values.

I think that when you consider the implications of the amending strategies…. We do point out — and this is not an anti-park or anti–protected area comment — that there are opportunities, where parks and protected areas exist, to utilize those to offset and/or mitigate some of the impacts of other resource values — obviously not timber, but they can be used to offset some of the other resources.

We have to review these management strategies, not constraints, for all values. As such, we have some opinions on some of them. But we're not experts. Your job is to hear from all.

We feel that some of the strategies, such as riparian management zones, are still fulfilling their purpose, and they shouldn't be modified. We also, though, feel that there are remaining strategies, and we need to examine them from the perspective of: are they accomplishing the original intent or not?

These strategies were brought in when we had green pine. As was pointed out, we now have hillsides with VQOs that are dead pine. Is that accomplishing the intent or not, and are there options that we can modify or adjust the strategy in a way that will maximize the sustainable harvest and yet still retain the value of the strategy?

For example, in visual quality, there will be zones where we may be able to increase the allowed percentage of alteration in a visual class. There are zones where we may not.

We're suggesting that in things like visual qualities each one should now be put through a designated filter of core value to determine if the designation is still appropriate and/or if something can be done to modify.

Similarly, in old growth…. Currently we work on a broad-brush quantity approach to old-growth values, where it may be possible to identify higher old-growth values in a smaller area which accomplish the same thing.

It may also be possible in old growth to reduce the age that defines "old," as long as that's ecologically appropriate. In other words, it doesn't have to be an age class 8. It may be a 7 or a 6, but it has the same characteristics as an 8; therefore, it could be used.

Another area which hasn't been spoken on too much, one of the areas we feel quite passionate about because our tree farm licence falls in this enhanced fibre management zone…. We feel that there is still room to grow the timber harvest in an enhanced fibre management zone.

However, all of the policies that have come out still treat enhanced fibre management the same as any other zone that allows forestry. We're not seeing any intensity in an enhanced fibre management zone, even though the intent was to have a more intense harvest.

These are our opinions. We put them forward because we want to make sure the committee understands that these strategies and adjusting them are not all or nothing, which actually makes the job quite a bit more challenging. We feel that as we move into this, there's going to be much more need for local decision-making and, potentially, non-legislated decision-making, where there can be blends of decisions in an area that work.

We cite, for example, that there may be, in the case of a certain strategy, the ability for the southern portion of a timber supply area to have the constraint relaxed but potentially have it remain the same in the northern part of a timber supply area, depending on the strategy and depending on the population, source, etc.

Connected to these suggestions, we do know that if we modify the strategies and/or use these great words that say, "Optimize the sustainable harvest," which we believe in…. We also encourage the committee to remember that they need to be considered in the sustainability and economic viability of the industry and the communities, as well as the industry's social licence and impacts on forest
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and product certifications.

Twenty years ago, if we'd have been in front of this committee, it would have been: "Damn the torpedoes. Where are the trees?" We have matured. We are managers of all resources. We realize that.

The comments that have been raised. Yes, certification and our product certification in the marketplace are critical. We know we can make some adjustments. Strategies were brought in when we had miles and miles to work with. Now we all have to look at these things, and we all have to compromise.

We know that the allowable harvest, say, in the Prince George TSA can't be retained at 9.6. We understand the data. We understand, though, that there are adjustments that could be made that may work to keep it as high as possible, because our job is to keep as many people working as possible, not that everyone is going to be immune from the impacts.

We knew this day was coming, or this period was coming, when we had to tackle the beetles. Now we're just trying to look for what the best approach is for the province as a whole and the people of it.

We also would like to say that while we've cited flexibilities in the strategies, timber supply mitigation has to be done fairly and equally across the beetle zone, and it cannot advantage or disadvantage one party or another over any particular company or area.

You asked how decisions regarding potential actions should be made. We appreciate that you're in a consultation, and we compliment you for that. We know that you have to consider both the social and economic values. But we do say that at the end of the day, the decision needs to be made by the government. All the rest of us are resource users, but ultimately, the government is the one that will make the final decisions. That's in our opinion.

You asked about specific information about our local area that we'd like the committee to know. This won't be so much about our local area as it is, maybe, about timber supply analysis. We would recommend that we, as an industry and as a province, need to now look at non-recoverable losses as an opportunity. We have been chasing mountain pine beetle — rightly so — but at the expense of bypassing areas of blown-down timber, other insect-damaged timber, fire-damage, etc. There have simply been areas where there are a lot of things on the go, and the priority has been pine beetle.

Remember, though, that these other things are still harvesting trees. We now have to ramp up our level of forest health by logging in damaged timber and logging in old stands that are increasingly losing their values as we over the next few years move out of pine harvest.

We would also suggest that the committee should review growth and yield data, particularly for our second-growth stands. In our area, we're finding that the site index for second-growth pine stands is much higher than it was anticipated to be. Ironically, though, we tend to be disbelieving our own data, at least within the regulatory world. The data points to a much higher growth. We don't tend to believe it, therefore we discount it or we ignore it. But I think the realities are that our growth and yield in second-growth stands is much higher.

We also would like to cite and hope…. This may be posted on your website, and if so, we apologize. There were two reports put out in early June of this year. One of them is the presentation that ADM Kevin Kriese made called Mid-Term Timber Supply Options. Second was June 8 on Mid-Term Timber Supply for the Prince George TSA. I think both of those are very valuable in that they outline the adjustments that could be made to various resources and the changes that those strategies could generate in terms of allowable cuts.

I think that the public should be made aware of those because it's very beneficial to see what is significant and what is not significant in terms of these strategies and what you may consider for their adjustments.

They also, I think, do a very good job of pointing out what some of the implications are of addressing some of those strategies. You've heard them actually, today, in a very straightforward way, but we would recommend that you look at those, because they also deal with the entire beetle zone.

J. Rustad (Chair): Blair, if I may. I do apologize, but I need to be fair to all. I realize this is actually the end. This is the last presentation that's signed up.

J. Rustad (Chair): Well, everybody was given 15 minutes, and we're over that now, and I know you're going to have an opportunity for another presentation. So if I could ask you, perhaps, to sum up a little bit?

B. Mayes: Very important to us — wood supply is regional in nature. Any recommendations made by the committee still have to permit wood to move freely throughout the Interior. We depend on wood from a large circle, which encompasses many communities.

You are hearing that timber should stay locally. If you adopt that recommendation, you in essence eliminate Dunkley's ability to access timber supply. There are others that need supplemental timber, all of which comes from this great big area.

You may also hear that B.C. Timber Sales should be eliminated and its volume should be assigned to a particular group or into a particular area. Again, we urge you to resist this concept. B.C. Timber Sales plays a vital role in supplying us with timber as well as the basis for our market-pricing stumpage system.

Then the last one is, first, thank you very much for listening to us.
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One recommendation we have at the end is that after you've submitted your recommendations into government…. We realize that there will probably be analysis and reporting requirements, but we would recommend that you also have a communication strategy that has you coming back to the communities and explaining what you heard and why you made the recommendations you made.

Boy, I tell you, I've got a whole bunch of questions. But I do know that you've got an opportunity to present at another time. Since we're out of time — and I'm sure other members have a ton of questions as well — maybe one of the things you can think about for a future presentation or a written presentation to us is the differences between how you manage on your TFL versus how you manage in your volume-based components that you operate in.

Thank you very much for your presentation. Sorry, if I may just add to that. You had asked a question about those presentations. They are on our website, so just to confirm that they are there and available.

At this time, since we have some extra time available in terms of the committee presentations, we will open it up for an open-mike period for anybody that would like to present to us. The open-mike periods allow for five minutes and traditionally don't come with questions and answers, but we could be flexible if required.

J. Salokannel: My name is Juha Salokannel. I'm a registered professional forester. I've worked here since June of '78. I represent woodlots — not the companies and the people behind me here.

My woodlot has had spruce beetle, balsam beetle, Douglas fir beetle, pine beetle and spruce budworm. So as Blair said, there is more than just one thing going on here. Right now, if the people in this room were the forest, back 30 years ago, eight out of ten would be 90 years old. So the hospitals and the doctors and the professionals won't help you. You're going to die. That's what's happening to our forests out there.

We do have young stands coming in, but the only solution is going to be the utilization. Right now the simple thing that you can do is stop brushing aspen, stop doing administrative brushing for trees that could be a future crop — okay? We've got 30- or 40-year-old plantations that have beautiful deciduous on them, but we don't have a market for deciduous. We have to develop a market.

In terms of wood supply in Fort St. James, in raw numbers, 30 years ago it was 40 percent pine, 40 percent spruce, 30 percent balsam. The deciduous and the fir were single digit numbers, very little. But that number is coming up with our reforestation efforts and the deciduous coming up voluntarily.

That's about all I've got to add. But look at our stocking standards. Accept deciduous. It'll save you a lot of money in brushing, and in the future it will be something that we could use.

Also, all the time I've been here, we burn brush piles. We need co-gen. We need more pellet plants, because there's a huge amount of fibre that we can't cut into saw wood, can't get into the pulp mill, that is being burnt right now. We need the co-gen. We need the pellet plants.

K. Gordon: My name's Keith Gordon. I'm a former forester. I'm a retired forester, and I, too, have lived in our community for a long time and worked in government and have watched all this unfold.

What I'm going to tell you here is a result of reading the report that was first posted on the website about this scenario and ways that we could address the thing, the falldown effect, if I can call it that.

The report outlined the cut position of four timber supply areas, being Burns Lake, Prince George, Quesnel and Williams Lake. The numbers of cubic metres per year for each unit were at a highest harvest rate of, in order, 3.2 million for Lakes, 15 million for Prince George, five million for Quesnel and 5.8 for Williams Lake. These rates are now dropping and are predicted to drop to a base case of approximately one-third of these numbers within a few years.

The report says that drop can be mitigated by amounts: 100,000 in the Lakes, which isn't very much; 4.8 million in P.G., which is, of course, huge; 400,000 in Quesnel; and 1.2 million in Williams Lake.

The most scary part of the report for me was how we could mitigate the falldown. In short, the ways offered to government are to log land where careful planning, the LRMPs and all the negotiations that were carried out decreed that we should not log these portions. Now we're saying that we should go back and do it so we can have more timber. I just ask you to remember how carefully those were negotiated, because they meant a hell of a lot. They were trying to mitigate the impact of harvest for reasons that people have spoken about here very eloquently.

These areas have value as old-growth timber, and there was a comment that we could reduce these. Old-growth timber areas are very important. We need to know what forests looked like when they were undisturbed, what lived in them. An example is the ancient forest area near Prince George — a profound area to look at.

Areas of forest are critical habitat for wildlife and for biodiversity so species don't go extinct. It's pretty important. There are scenic landscapes that the public value for their beauty. Yes, even when they're dead they have beauty. The areas that are dead have young trees under-
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neath them. They may not grow as fast if measures are carried out, but they do come back.

In Williams Lake there are steep areas that are so unstable that harvesting is likely to cause landslides and environmental damage. I don't recommend that we try to mitigate the impact by going in there.

Areas are excluded because there was so little timber they are judged uneconomic — okay? They are very low volumes. Yes, the economies of logging do change over time, but to include a huge area of obviously no value, because it costs more to get it than it's worth, in your calculations to justify logging good timber is false economy and poor forestry, I think.

Finally, I think people should understand that all the set-asides are a product of hard bargaining and middle-of-the-road consensus decisions and extremely arduous planning, as I said before. To go and log them now will go against what was planned and promised, and it will certainly increase the chances of species and ecosystems becoming extinct.

Would anybody else like to present to the committee? One last look around the room — okay.

Well, I want to thank everybody for coming out today. I certainly want to thank the people for the information they've given us, the presenters. As well, I know there has been quite a bit of conversation that's gone on in the brief breaks that we've had, and I think that's been a good thing, in terms of generating the level of discussion that we need to be having around this.

Our committee has been touring. Starting on Monday we were in Smithers and Houston. Tuesday we were in Burns Lake and Fraser Lake, and today we started off in Fort St. James. We'll be in Vanderhoof this afternoon. Tomorrow we're in Prince George and Mackenzie, and Friday we are in McBride and Valemount.

Then on the 5th and 6th we are in 100 Mile House, Williams Lake and Quesnel and then back to Prince George. On the week of the 9th, 10th, 11th we will be holding provincial meetings for those three days down in Vancouver. Then we'll be back out on the road to Merritt and Kamloops on the 12th.

I just want to remind people again, in case something comes up in conversation or other thoughts, if you'd like to give us a written response or written ideas, that can be received by the committee up until July 20. Once again, the website for the information on that is www.leg.bc.ca/timbercommittee. That's also where all the reports that have been talked about and referred to and information that we gather has been placed.

So with that, I would like to…. Rob, do you want to say one more comment? Come up to the mike, please. Remember, this is all recorded, and this is live. Rob, if you could just say your name.

R. MacDougall: Okay. Rob MacDougall. I'm the mayor for the district of Fort St. James. I guess in my nervousness here to start this morning…. I just want to recognize that this session is being held within the Nak'azdli's traditional territory, and with that recognition comes respect. So with that, thank you very much, and I thank everybody for being here today and providing food for thought, certainly.

J. Rustad (Chair): Thank you, Rob. As the last word, I just once again want to thank everybody for coming out today, and this committee stands adjourned.

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3) Apollo Forest Products Ltd.	Greg Stewart
	Bruce McLean
4) Regional District of Bulkley-Nechako	Tom Greenaway
5) Tl'oh Forest Products LP	Laura Chernowski
6) Takla Lake First Nation	Chief Dolly Abraham
	Councillor Elke Lepka
7) Dunkley Lumber Ltd.	Blair Mayes
	Doug Perdue
8) Juha Salokannel
9) Keith Gordon
10) District of Fort St. James	Mayor Rob MacDougall

Chair:	* John Rustad (Nechako Lakes BC Liberal)
Deputy Chair:	* Norm Macdonald (Columbia River–Revelstoke NDP)
Members:	* Harry Bains (Surrey-Newton NDP)
	* Donna Barnett (Cariboo-Chilcotin BC Liberal)
	* Eric Foster (Vernon-Monashee BC Liberal)
	* Bill Routley (Cowichan Valley NDP)
	* Ben Stewart (Westside-Kelowna BC Liberal)
	* denotes member present
Clerk:	Kate Ryan-Lloyd
Committee Staff:	Larry Pedersen (Technical Advisor)
	Jacqueline Quesnel (Administrative Coordinator)
Attending Government Staff:	Susanna Laaksonen-Craig (Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations)

Witnesses:	Chief Dolly Abraham (Takla Lake First Nation)
	Laura Chernowski (Tl'oh Forest Products LP)
	Keith Gordon
	Tom Greenaway (Regional District of Bulkley-Nechako)
	Ross Hamilton
	Vanessa Joseph (Tl'azt'en Nation)
	Carl Leon (Nak'azdli Band)
	Elke Lepka (Takla Lake First Nation)
	Rob MacDougall (Mayor, District of Fort St. James)
	Bruce McLean (Sinclar Group Forest Products Ltd.; Apollo Forest Products Ltd.)
	Blair Mayes (Dunkley Lumber Ltd.)
	Renel Mitchell (Tl'azt'en Nation)
	Doug Perdue (Dunkley Lumber Ltd.)
	Juha Salokannel
	Greg Stewart (President, Sinclar Group Forest Products Ltd.; Apollo Forest Products Ltd.)
	Leonard Thomas (Nak'azdli Band)

1) District of Fort St. James	Mayor Rob MacDougall
	Ross Hamilton
2) Nak'azdli Band	Leonard Thomas
	Councillor Carl Leon
Tl'azt'en Nation	Renel Mitchell
	Vanessa Joseph

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS (Hansard)

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON TIMBER SUPPLY

REPORT OF PROCEEDINGS
(Hansard)

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON
TIMBER SUPPLY