April 22, 2021
The BC government’s budget released this week is a significant move to minimize disruption to the status quo of old-growth liquidation by timber companies, as it lacks the critically important funding needed to support First Nations old-growth protection initiatives at the most critical time – while the province is engaging First Nations communities to develop the new key policies and legislation regarding the fate of old-growth forests across BC, including key logging deferrals and potential areas to protect or not to protect.
In particular, absent is the major funding needed for Indigenous management and stewardship of Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas, or IPCA’s (in contrast to the $2.3 billion in funding the federal government has allocated largely for IPCA’s in their new budget), and the financing needed for the development of sustainable economic alternatives (for example in tourism, clean energy, sustainable seafood, non-timber forest products, value-added second-growth forestry, etc.) to old-growth logging in First Nations communities. Without this funding there can be no large scale, systematic shift from the status quo of liquidating the last high-productivity or grandest old-growth forests at the ecological and political heart of the controversy. The new BC budget also lacks funding to purchase and protect private lands that have old-growth forests and other endangered ecosystems. Significant tracts of old-growth forests occur on private lands on eastern Vancouver Island.
“The BC government has missed the boat on providing the critical funding at the most critical time during the development of new policies and legislation to manage BC’s old-growth forests – that is, funding for the management, stewardship, and sustainable economic development for First Nations communities tied to the protection of old-growth forests. Without these vital funds, the BC government now appears to be attempting to ensure that the ongoing consultations on old-growth policies, logging deferrals and protected areas ultimately results in minimal disruption to the status quo of old-growth logging in most of the high productivity stands, the areas with the largest trees – while claiming credit for logging deferrals and the eventual protection of vast tracts of lower-productivity old-growth stands with smaller trees,” stated Ken Wu, executive director of the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance.
“The BC government's bet is that all this is too complex for most people to follow, and that the economic dependency that they’ve fostered on old-growth timber revenues in First Nations communities with limited economic options will minimize disruption to the available old-growth timber supply for logging companies as an outcome of these consultations. With this critical deficiency in the provincial budget for old-growth forest protection, it’s clear that buying time and maintaining the economic dependency on old-timber revenues in communities to maintain the status quo of liquidating the grandest, high-productivity old-growth forests at the heart of the ecological, economic and political controversy is at the core of the BC government’s old-growth agenda,” stated Wu.
The Union of BC Indian Chiefs (UBCIC), the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance and several conservation groups released a joint letter on the central importance of conservation financing from the province in February. You can find the full letter here.
During the last provincial election, the BC NDP government committed to implementing all 14 recommendations of their own public input panel, the Old-Growth Strategic Review panel – whose recommendations included the need for interim logging deferrals within 6 months of the panel’s release (in September of 2020) on the most at-risk old-growth forests, including the high-productivity (grandest), rarest, oldest and most intact old-growth in BC. The BC government missed the 6-month deadline last month, while insisting they met the deadline by touting logging deferrals in other areas largely dominated by smaller old-growth trees, second-growth, and old-growth that was already off-limits to logging (not the endangered high-productivity and most at risk old-growth forests as expected by the Panel).
In her statements after the deferral deadline last month, Forest Minister Katrine Conroy erected straw man arguments insinuating that the conservation movement wanted an immediate moratorium to shut down the forestry industry (rather than a subset of the subset of forests in BC for interim logging deferral, as stipulated by the Old-Growth Strategic Review panel – the most at-risk old-growth, within a province dominated by second-growth now), which she then “debunked” to try to make the BC government look like moderates against a fabricated opponent…all to mask their failure in meeting the 6 month logging deferral deadline based on the Panel's stipulations.
By failing to commit to the key funding for old-growth in their provincial budget, the systematic deferral and protection of the remaining high-productivity old-growth forests and other most at-risk forests cannot happen on any major scale.
“For a government to say they’re in favour of old-growth protection but without the funding is like a government declaring their support for education and health care - just not the funding. It's a hollow promise at its core, stated for slimey PR purposes,” states Wu.
While the consultations and controversy on old-growth forest policy development continue, it’s important to bear in mind a few key facts:
Old-Growth forests are overwhelmingly on the unceded territories of First Nations across BC.
No old-growth protection can happen without First Nations consent.
Successive BC governments including the current one have fostered an economic dependency on old-growth timber revenues for First Nations who have limited economic opportunities on their reserves, as a result of colonialism and racism.
A lack of funding for economic alternatives for First Nations will thus limit the disruption to the status quo of old-growth forest liquidation across most of BC, in particular in regards to the high-productivity stands with the largest trees that are most sought after by the timber industry and that are the ecological heart of old-growth forests in BC.
Of course, the BC government fully understands this.
An analysis by scientists of the BC government’s first major 9 old-growth logging deferral areas as part of the new old-growth policy development process revealed that they only constitute about 1% of the high-productivity old-growth in BC (and that only 1% of the deferral areas were high-productivity old-growth previously available for logging).
“Support for the protection of nature and old-growth is virtually absent in the BC government’s new budget - it looks to be the work of a Nature Deficit Party - and it will have disastrous consequences for old-growth forests across BC unless the gap is filled now by other levels of government and conservation groups now, due to the BC government’s willful neglect of the key funding,” stated Ken Wu, Endangered Ecosystems Alliance executive director. “The BC NDP, which presents itself as a progressive and environmental party, has actually been put to shame by the federal Liberal government when it comes to the protection of nature - compare the $2.3 billion commitment of the feds to expand protected areas, including Indigenous ecosystem-protection plans, to the virtually absent funding commitment to protect old-growth forests by the BC government. The BC government has increased the budget for existing parks, but that is of far secondary importance to funding for the establishment of new protected areas.”
The province has increased funding in the new budget for First Nations participation in negotiations with the province over legislation, policies, programs, and participation in land and resource activities via a $60 million funding increase at the Ministry of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation. However, without the funding to change the economic status quo in First Nations communities, that is, for a shift towards the economic alternatives to old-growth logging revenues, those consultations will result in an overwhelming fall-back onto the status quo – with the proviso now that federal funding for Indigenous Protected and Conserved Areas and the work of the conservation movement to ensure funding may still yet turn things around.
“While the BC government has fallen short in their funding commitment, it’s still not too late for them to cobble together some conservation financing and IPCA funding this year by earmarking funds from various items in their climate, forestry, environment and Indigenous reconciliation budgets. In addition, it’s important to remember that under pressure the BC government has opened the door potentially to a major overhaul on old-growth policy in BC for the first time since the mid-1990’s. There is a light at the end of the tunnel to save much of what’s left if the province commits to the funding and to making the grandest, high-productivity and the most at-risk old-growth forests at the center of their logging deferral and protection mandate,” stated Wu.
More background info on the need for Old-Growth Financing:
See a key news article in The Narwhal
See a joint letter with the Union of BC Indian Chiefs and conservation groups.
And see a more detailed media release.
Please help us out with whatever you can! Click here to donate.