The two sawmills most affected by the Special Committee on Timber Supply don't even exist anymore.
Lakeland Mills in Prince George and Babine Forest Products in nearby Burns Lake were both destroyed by fatal fiery explosions (each one still under investigation) earlier this year and part of the uncertainty around their rebuild was what this committee might say in its final report. That report was released on Wednesday. Some of the recommendations spoke directly to the rebuild of these two lumber institutions.
"From our perspective, the findings in this report do not cause us further concern about access to fiber," said Greg Stewart, president of Prince George's Sinclar Group, owners of Lakeland. "This report will not be the determining factor in whether we rebuild or not, which is great news for us, it certainly had the potential to kill those hopes, and it did not."
With the report's recommendations to not clear the slate and reallocate every mill's harvesting percentages, and the recommendations to recalculate each region's allowable annual cuts to include previously unallocated "marginally economic stands" of forest, the decisions for Lakeland can be focused on their own business planning, Stewart said.
The owners of Babine, Hampton Affiliates of Oregon, issued a statement on Wednesday as well. Owner Steve Zika had said for weeks that the committee's report was the going to either kill their dreams of rebuilding or bring them to life. While not declaring that outcome until the report is fully digested, Zika did say the committee's recommendation to go after marginally economic stands was a big step in the right direction.
"The economic situation in Burns Lake is dire," Zika said. "The Babine tragedy eliminated 200 direct family-wage jobs and an estimated 600 other indirect jobs in the area. Despite numerous reports of potential employment in other towns and positive economic development projects, the fact remains that over half of Babine's employees are unemployed at this time, along with many of the contractors and vendors affected by the sawmill tragedy. Unless a sawmill rebuilding process begins soon, many community members, including First Nations, may have no other choice but to look for government-funded subsistence."
Committee chair John Rustad said he didn't think that would be necessary, even though the committee specifically veered away from what Zika called for the most - a wholesale redistribution of timber licenses. The Lakes Timber Supply Area currently cuts about 2 million cubic metres of timber and for the next two years that level is expected to remain the same, followed by a drop to only 500,000 cubic metres following 2015 if nothing is done to mitigate the ensuing problem of rotting pine forests past their prime. (Pines account for about 65 per cent of the Lakes District's trees - much more than most areas.)
Zika pointed out that already, half the Lakes timber supply flows not to Burns Lake mills but down the road to mills in Houston and Fraser Lake. If that didn't change, he said, and the big cutback happened, there would be no wood left for Babine to cut, thus no way to rebuild it.
But, said Rustad, the solution was not in destroying the business plans of the Houston and Fraser Lake companies, but in growing the timber supply. According to the committee's research, by going after marginally economic wood in the Lakes District, the timber supply there would go up to about 1 million cubic metres per year.
"My hope is, Hampton will view this positively," Rustad said. "On a personal basis and from the committee's view, that extra timber should be sufficient to support some form of [Babine rebuild]."
Moving the BC forest industry to more of a land-based model (each company responsible for a section of forest in perpetuity) instead of the volume-based model (each company competing amongst themselves year to year for various harvesting areas here and there all over the map) would be Zika's suggestion for long-term improvements.
Stewart agreed, in principle, and appreciated that the committee suggested this course of action, but only under careful and consultative conditions.
Stewart said "I think it's a progressive report" that appears to have heard and understood the concerns of forest companies expressed during the months of consultation. But just as pleasing to him was the way it steered government away from any thoughts of blurring the environmental lines or dismissing the years of grassroots science that built the protected areas and land-use policies in each community.
