A 2018 report by William Lahey was supposed to serve as a sustainability roadmap for Nova Scotia’s forestry industry, but three years later, the author says substandard, clear-cut forest practices still abound.
Lahey, who is president of King’s College University in Halifax, was commissioned by the province to assess the forestry industry and recommend changes. However, a evaluation de Lahey this week on what has been accomplished so far shows little progress.
Although there is some “good faith” planning at the government level, Lahey said National Observer of Canada that so far nothing has changed on the ground. Five of the 45 recommendations in the initial document, which is often referred to as the Lahey Report.
Recommendations that have been implemented include the licensing of Crown land to the Mi’kmaq forestry initiative and goals for the implementation of an ecological forestry model in new provincial legislation, the Environmental Objectives and Sustainable Prosperity Law (EGSPA), which was approved in October.
In Lahey’s initial report, he calls for existing Crown land to be divided into a triad forest model, which divides forests into three sections: production forest, protection forest, and “the ecological matrix.” You would see some forests completely protected from logging and others cut down at different rates depending on age and other factors. The “matrix” category would have forests with mixed protection and logging.
“Under this approach, aligning forestry with ecological well-being involves categorizing forests as predominantly for preserving ecological integrity, predominantly for producing wood, or for a balanced combination of conservation and production objectives, all with the overarching goal of aligning forestry. with ecology. protection, ”the initial report read.
However, although the triad has been included in the EGSPA, it is not being practiced in the field, which is an essential suggestion of the original document.
What people are reading
“It is of particular concern that forestry other than ecological forestry continues to be carried out on Crown lands that will be largely reserved for ecological forestry once the triad is finally implemented on Crown lands.” Read part of the 2021 assessment.
He said the most important recommendation in the 2018 report was to shift logging to ecological forestry practices on a “substantial majority of Crown lands not managed exclusively for conservation or intensive forestry.” In Lahey’s update, he said logging rates have remained the same since the report.
Other highlights from the 2018 report, such as increasing wildlife protection and developing a strategy for owners to incorporate eco-friendly forestry practices, remain intact.
“There are many recommendations and they are all important. I wouldn’t have done any of them if I didn’t think they were important, ”says William Lahey, author of the 2018 review. #NS #Silviculture #Recording #ClearCutting
“There are many recommendations and they are all important. I wouldn’t have done any of them if I didn’t think they were important, ”he said.
“So my big conclusion is that the implementation so far cannot be considered a success.”
Similar trends are unfolding across the country, and Canada’s forests are in such trouble that they have, in fact, released more carbon than they have absorbed since 2001. Cutting down forests, especially primary forests, releases millions of tons of carbon emissions. greenhouse gases. It can also make weather phenomena worse; high levels of clearcutting in British Columbia exacerbated last month’s catastrophic flood.
Between 2005 and 2017, 3.6 million hectares of primary and secondary forests were cut down in British Columbia, where there have been similar calls to ban the practice.
In the original report, Lahey made separate recommendations for the Crown and private lands, which are heavily exploited in NS.She said that he emphasized in both his written and verbal report that his suggestions for the management of Crown land, i.e. the triad model being implemented and clearcutting is drastically reduced could be incorporated more quickly as the government already controls the area.
“That is our best chance to experience some early green victories,” he said.
The province is known for having the highest percentage of privately owned land in the country, over 70 percent. In British Columbia, five percent of the land is private; in Alberta, 10 percent; and in canada, 11 percent.
It means that private owners have a lot of power in terms of preserving biodiversity and nature. Many private lots are logged by mill contractors. Forestry, in which contractors grow and grow trees, also takes place on private land.
Although he said changes to Crown lands may come first, Lahey said he “never intended it to be Crown lands first and then private lands second,” noting that he has not seen much progress in private land recommendations.
In the review, Lahey said the government stagnation could be due to a number of reasons, including resistance from the provincial government. He describes a factor as the difficulty the department has not only adjusting the mindset and culture of business as usual to greater protection of ecosystems, but also understanding that a fundamental shift in mindset and culture is required. .
This is not the first time NS has been told to reduce logging
For Ray Plourde, senior wilderness coordinator at the Ecological Action Center in Halifax, the provincial government’s failure to reduce clear cutting feels like déjà vu.
More than 10 years ago, the province indicated in its Natural Resources Strategy for Nova Scotia that 96 percent of forested land is harvested through clear logging and “the policy framework sets a goal to reduce clear logging to no more than 50 percent of all crops. The target, which will be phased in over five years, will be set by regulation. “
A quinquennium Progress report then he backtracked on that promise.
“… The Department of Natural Resources is moving away from a system that determines the amount of logging based on its percentage of harvested land,” the 2020 update reads in part.
“Instead, the province has developed tools that help ensure that all harvest treatments, including clear felling, are aligned with the science-based requirements of the Nova Scotia lands.”
The buck has been passed a lot in terms of forest management in NS, Plourde said. Under new progressive Conservative Prime Minister Tim Houston, the EGSPA was passed in October, meaning the Lahey report’s recommendations are supposed to be implemented in 2023. However, they only apply to Crown lands through the law.
Lahey hopes that the provincial government, which is now reviewing the assessment, understands the urgent nature of the update.
“I can understand that that amount of time might be necessary because the new government has to start from where the last government left off,” Lahey said.
“But for me, having confirmed that deadline, it creates the urgency of provisional measures to protect the forests, which, in the absence of provisional measures, may well be crossed out.”
It is vital to stop clearing immediately, Plourde said. Otherwise, while in legislative limbo, significant portions of the forest could be cut down and should be protected under the triad model. That would mean further loss of biodiversity, he said.
“We are again calling on the government, as we have done for the past three years, to place a moratorium on all clearcutting treatments on public Crown lands until new organic forestry regulations recommended by … Lahey are actually implemented on the ground, ”he said.
Reference-www.nationalobserver.com