A presentation by a Forest Practices Board (FPB) official last week has been turned into a political football.
NDP forest critic Norm Macdonald has accused former forest minister Pat Bell of grossly understating the amount of Crown land that have not been adequately replanted and used a presentation by FPB special investigations manager Marvin Eng to support his claim.
However, Bell has shot back that Macdonald is distorting Eng's findings, which were given at the Western Silviculture Contractors' Association annual conference in Kamloops on Friday.
In a press release, Macdonald said Bell, as forest minister, claimed the total NSR land to be around 240,000 hectares but Eng's presentation indicated the actual situation is closer to those professional forester Anthony Britneff also provided at the conference.
Britneff calculated the amount of not satisfactorily restocked land is 2.3 million hectares and rising to 9.1 million once land struck by fire, pests and disease are accounted for.
"Compounding the problem is the fact that we just don't know the full extent of the problem," said Macdonald. "Even Mr. Eng acknowledged that his figures were based on old data.
"This government made massive cuts to the forest service, which has left the service unable to paint a true picture of what's actually happening on the forest floor."
In response, Bell said Macdonald is "trying to twist what someone is saying to serve his own purposes."
Bell said his understanding is that Eng continued to confirm what has been said all along - that about 730,000 hectares is deemed not sufficiently restocked in the province, but about 500,000 of that is being replanted under forest company's normal obligations on a rolling basis.
Much of it has been replanted, Bell added, but the trees are not sufficiently mature for the site to be considered restocked.
A further 240,000 is land in need of replanting that has not yet been dealt with, said Bell, but is the subject of various programs to get the areas reseeded.
As for the remaining 1.3 million hectares, Bell said it's area not logged but hit by the mountain pine beetle, fire and disease.
"It is information that I have repeated at every location, it's very consistent with what I've said," Bell said. "And to issue a news release the way he [Macdonald] has is just nothing short of trying to create a sensational story out of nothing."
In the 1990s, the province spent an average of $22.25 million annually on programs assessing forest inventory. By the last budget, that had shrunk to $7.5 million, the NDP asserts.
But Bell said about $34 million a year has been committed to the Trees for Tomorrow program and a new program has been launched through Pacific Carbon Trust to encourage private companies to invest in silviculture.
As for Britneff's claim of 9.1 million hectares, Bell said it's "completely off base."
"He is talking about a significant amount of area outside the timber harvesting land base that is never considered to be viable stands and shouldn't be considered viable stands," Bell said. "There are ecosystems that would not be appropriate as creating a harvestable, marketable stand - it's parks, it's protected areas."
