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November 9, 2022
The Narwhal
By Sarah Cox

In August, as Minister of Environment and Climate Change Steven Guilbeault prepared to visit an old-growth forest park in West Vancouver, his office drafted a news release for the occasion. It was never sent out.

The federal government had committed up to $50 million to permanently protect BC’s old-growth forests and was “awaiting the matching commitment from the province,” said the draft release, a copy of which was obtained by The Narwhal.

In the lead up to the United Nations biodiversity conference Canada will host in December, the federal government is eager to see permanent protections announced for BC’s old-growth forests as part of Ottawa’s commitment to protect 30 per cent of the country’s land and waters by 2030.

But with less than a month before the COP15 conference gets underway in Montreal, the BC government has yet to accept Ottawa’s offer of funding to protect old-growth forests that store carbon and provide habitat for many species at risk of extinction, including spotted owls, marbled murrelets and woodland caribou.

That leaves environmental groups and the BC Green Party questioning the sincerity of the BC government’s promise to protect old-growth forests and embark on a forestry transition many believe is long overdue.

“It’s really critical that there’s money on the table,” Stand.earth forest campaigner Tegan Hansen said. “And BC hasn’t seized on that to actually support communities in transitioning away from old-growth logging and protecting forests.”

The draft release noted Guilbeault’s visit intended to show “solidarity and support for the protection of old-growth forest in British Columbia, and highlight ongoing discussions with the province to establish an Old Growth Nature Fund in BC.”

“Old-growth forests in British Columbia are some of the most biologically diverse and productive ecosystems in Canada,” Guilbeault stated in the draft release. “They are also some of the most important and largest natural carbon sinks in the world. With deep-rooted significance to Indigenous communities and of importance to all British Columbians, old-growth forests require greater protections.”

Guilbeault’s office declined to comment directly on the draft release, which offered the province $50 million. In an emailed response to questions, Guilbeault’s press secretary, Kaitlyn Power, said the 2022 federal budget allows for $55.1 million over three years to protect old-growth forests in BC The budget said the funding was conditional on a matching investment from the provincial government.

“Our government will continue collaborating with the province to get a good deal to protect BC’s beloved nature,” Power wrote.

Asked if the provincial government will accept and match the federal old-growth funding, the BC Ministry of Forests referred the Narwhal to the BC Ministry of Land, Water and Resource Stewardship. In an emailed response to questions, the Land Ministry said the province is working with the federal government to develop a Nature Agreement that will, among other aims, “advance reconciliation by supporting Indigenous leadership on conservation efforts.”

“The proposed agreement presents an opportunity both for a more collaborative, long-term relationship between the federal and provincial governments and to build an integrated, landscape-based approach to nature conservation and stewardship,” the Land Ministry wrote.

(Following publication, when pushed on whether or not BC would be taking the federal money, the Ministry of Forests said: “The $50 million pledge is a welcome first step and we continue the important with our federal partners to do more to protect biodiversity and old-growth forests.”)

Old-growth funding a chance to end the ‘war in the woods’

BC is known throughout the world for the giant, old-growth trees that grow in moss-carpeted rainforests in coastal regions and in the rare inland temperate rainforest in the province’s interior. Following decades of industrial logging, most of the province’s unprotected old-growth forests have been logged.

Low-elevation old-growth valley bottoms — home to the biggest trees and the greatest biodiversity — are the most at risk of being clear-cut. They have been identified as priorities for protection to avoid irreversible biodiversity loss.

During the 2020 provincial election campaign, the BC NDP promised to fully implement the recommendations of an old-growth review panel that called for a paradigm shift in the way BC’s forests are managed.

The panel, led by two foresters, said the province’s forests should be managed for ecosystem values, not for timber. Among other recommendations, the foresters said the government should support forest sector workers and communities as they adapt to changes resulting from a new forest management system.

Ken Wu, executive director of the Endangered Ecosystems Alliance, said the federal money, matched by BC, would be a “game-changer” for old-growth protections.

Old-growth logging has long been an issue of contention in BC More than 800 people were arrested in 1993 during months of logging protests, which became known as the “war in the woods,” in Clayoquot Sound on Vancouver Island. Since 2021, more than 1,000 people have been arrested trying to stop old-growth logging in and around Fairy Creek on Pacheedaht territory on southwest Vancouver Island.

“The BC government has a chance to finally put an end to the war in the woods by embracing the federal money, kicking in their own funding and directing it to the right places — the grandest, most at-risk old-growth forests — and to the right parties,” Wu said in an interview. The right parties are First Nations, who require funding for sustainable economic development initiatives linked to protected areas, he said, and not corporations.

“If they do that on a big enough scale, then they will have solved the war in the woods on the conservation side. And on the labor side, simultaneously they can be building a value-added, second-growth, smart forest economy with the right incentives and regulations.”

Yet even $100 million – $50 million from each of the federal and provincial governments – is not nearly enough to permanently protect BC’s old-growth forests, Wu said. Adding considerably to the pot would be BC’s share of $2.3 billion in federal funding to support nature conservation measures across the country, including Indigenous-led conservation. Wu estimated BC could receive between $200 million and $400 million from that fund.

“If BC were to match that, and then direct it in the right places, to the right parties, it could actually end old-growth logging in British Columbia and protect most endangered ecosystems.”

Wu also cautioned the use of federal money could still “go sideways” if the end result is to protect alpine and subalpine areas, “leaving out the valley bottoms and the big trees.”

The Union of BC Indian Chiefs has also called on the federal and provincial governments to finance old-growth forest protection, Indigenous protected areas and land use plans.

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