B.C.'s Big Timber Corporations Want it All
This photo, taken on MacMillan Bloedel's private land near Nanaimo, B.C. in April 1999 shows fresh second growth forest logging that MB says is not clearcutting. Called "variable retention logging," It's clearcutting," it's clearcutting with a few small trees left standing here and there. The forest industry is trying to gain ownership to public forest lands so that they can log or sell them essentially as they please.
B.C.'s NDP government is poised to do what no B.C. government has dared do in modern history - give away our public forest lands to large timber corporations.
In 1884, the province gave away almost one million hectares of land on Vancouver island- 20 percent of the Island- to the Esquimalt & Nanaimo Railroad Company as compensation for building and operating the railroad. The legacies of this deal include the private land holdings of MacMillan Bloedel Ltd. (MB), TimberWest and others and the virtual elimination of low-elevation oldgrowth forests on southeast Vancouver Island.
Now our government is proposing to trade away control over public land forever to compensate companies for losing the right to log on publicly owned lands recently turned into provincial parks. This proposed land giveaway- in lieu of the usual cash compensation - is a desperate, foolish act of a government deeply in debt.
Corporate privatization of publicly owned (crown) lands would forever surrender our children's rights... their right through our democratic system, how and for what purpose these lands should be used.
For year B.C.'s timber corporations have pressured our B.C. government to give them concessions. They've argued that they are disadvantaged by "high stumpage fees"(the fees paid to the province for the right to cut our public forests) and "the cumbersome and costly Forest Practices Code" (a set of logging rules enacted in 1995 to, theoretically at least, make sure that logging doesn't degrade streams, soils and wildlife habitat).
Down played are the major reasons for the industry's troubles and lack of profitability: low timber and pulp process due to a world over-supply, the collapse of Asian markets, competition from southern countries where forests grow quickly and are harvested cheaply, and less high quality wood in B.C. due to years of overcutting. Even Reid Carter, a wood markets expert and Forest Alliance Director, says one of the main reasons B.C. has one of the highest logging costs in the world is that "We are now in the guts and feathers. We are in the backs of valleys and the tops of the mountains. These are more expensive areas to operate in."
The B.C. government has already caved into many forest industry demands. it has reduced stumpage fee and cut environmental standards in the Forest Practices Code. But these concessions have not satisfied industry, which is seeking even deeper cost cuts at public expense. These multi-national timber corporations now suggest that our public forest lands be given to them as private lands or leased to them for 99 years or longer. They say this will entice them to keep doing business in B.C. They also argue that, "if they own the lands they'll manage them better", But owning land will not change the obligations of the timber corporations. They will remain accountable to their profit-seeking shareholders, not to the long term well-being of local citizens and the land's many values. It's far more likely that the timber companies want more private lands to get instant collateral at the banks and keep themselves afloat so that they can liquidate B.C.'s last remaining oldgrowth forests. They could use their private lands to intensively grow tree plantations as regulation-free as possible other non-timber resources like fish, wildlife, drinking water and recreation.
The logs in the foreground were selectively cut from the second growth forest in the background, a small private holding near Courtenay. There was work for the logging crew and profits for the landowner and the forest still stands. Both this and the MB logging shown on the front cover were on flat ground. MB could have done the same. All photos on this page taken April 1999.
The record shows that in general, private lands held by large timber corporations are poorly managed for the public good. In the U.S. Pacific Northwest, where there is higher corporate ownership of land than in B.C., the salmon are going extinct. Grizzly bears and wolves are endangered and on the verge of extinction.
On April 1, 1999 the B.C. government announced, to a shocked B.C. public, the first proposed privatization deal, negotiated behind closed doors by the Premier's office and MB. This deal is to compensate MB for its lost opportunity to cut trees on about 7,700 hectares of Timber Licence lands which the company relinquished for new protected areas on Vancouver Island, including Carmanah Pacific and Tsitika Provincial Parks.
The deal is: either pay MB $83.75 million in cash or, in lieu of cash, give MB up to 30,000 hectares of public land as free-simple private lands.
MB has picked the candidate lands it wants (see map above), many of which are prime real estate. As part of the land-give-a-way option, the government also agreed to reduce cut controls and environmental constraints on up to 90,000 hectares of existing MB private lands which currently are regulated like public lands because they had been "rolled into" Tree Farm Licence tenures. This does not look like an intent to manage lands better for the public good!
Two weeks after the MB privatization deal was announced, Deputy Premier Dan Miller floated the idea of privatizing up to 25 million hectares of land-about one-quarter of B.C.! Given that only about 30 million hectares of B.C. land grows commercial forests of any value, this means Miller is proposing to give the forestry corporations ownership over almost all of B.C.'s valuable forest land!
B.C.'s Forest Minister, Dave Zirnhelt, responded to Miller's trial balloon saying we must start a "dialogue" on the issue. Premier Clark responded by denying any intention to privatize B.C.'s publicly owned land, failing to mention the MB deal his government just negotiated.
June 30, 1999 is the deadline that government has set to decide whether it is to be cash or land for MB. There's a public review process about the MB deal (see back page of this paper), but time is short!
This may be the most significant public policy decision you ever have the chance to change. If you care about the rights and options available for our children, including their right to decide in the future how to best use and manage the lands of B.C., speak out about this MB land grab deal now. If MB gets the private lands it wants now, it's the beginning of a slippery slide of B.C. citizens into corporate serfdom!
