PRT Dryden customer support representative Mike Wood, RPF has been in the silviculture industry for 21 years, working in the forest nursery and field services sectors.
He says that harvests are the key to adequate funding for proper silviculture in the province. The industry needs to focus on the future rather than the way things used to be to ensure things turn around and harvests are maximized, he said.
"In 2000 Ontario planted 140 million seedlings, for 2010 it looks like we will be planting 50 million. That has been a long, steady, straight line decline that has tailed off fairly abruptly in the last year. Reduced harvests have absolutely affected forest renewal. Harvest drives renewal" Wood said. "There should be a two-year lag on average for manual planting and renewal but silviculture has been tailing off faster than that. It’s a defensive move by most industry to manage their costs."
"The government has to get the forest working again; there is no other way to properly fund silviculture and keep our forests healthy and productive. Government needs to create the conditions to ensure that the forest is being used fully" Wood said. "We are harvesting less than half of the allowable harvest in the province now; quite simply the other half of the forest is just not being cut and not being renewed."
"The last annual report by the MNR show that 55% of land harvested met ministry renewal standards. About half met the letter of the law, 85% met some kind of amended measure and 15% didn’t make it at all" Wood said. "So, if it is okay that we are only returning 55% of the land to the standards that we set, then great, but if not then we need to address it. I think we can do better, we are not and we should be."
Wood says that the government’s role in harvest and renewal is three-fold; to ensure that the forest is being used to its full capacity, to its highest and best use, to ensure that adequate silviculture standards are in place and to see that renewal happens in a timely fashion.
"The forest has to be used to its capacity because it is a wealth generator. It doesn’t matter what we produce, as long as it can be done sustainably and the forest can be protected and renewed in a timely fashion" Wood said.
"Adequate standards ensure that the forest is protected. We can’t just renew by just putting back placeholders. We need to see that the integrity of the forest is there, that we’re returning what we cut, and that the forest composition is maintained" Wood said. "If you think of the forest as a bank account, we cut the interest. If we can fully use that interest that’s great, if we can ensure that the interest payment is as large as possible then we all win. The only way we can do that is to ensure that our forests are maintained, that renewal happens on time and that it is effective."
Wood says that in order to move forward the industry need to innovate and embrace change.
"People are generally resistant to change and it’s the ones that embrace change that are going to be the winners here. We can’t afford to look backwards," Wood said. "We need to support the industry we have but the days of having a lumber mill in every town are over. If we think we can go backward 20 years in time while the rest of the world is moving forward, we are done."
"The worst thing we can do is interfere with innovation. There are new ways to use our forests that we had not even dreamed of 10 years ago. We shouldn’t really care what our forests are used for as long as they are sustainable over the long term. Rather than focus entirely on traditional products we need to also include in that mix products that are increasing in value" Wood said. "People aren’t running away from the forest they are looking for new things to do with it and they don’t have access to the fibre to make it happen, that needs to change. The sooner it changes, the better off we’ll all be."◊