B.C. forest watchdog recommends improving forest management to protect water

VICTORIA - British Columbia’s forest watchdog has recognized 4 key areas the place the administration of forestry practices can negatively have an effect on water and descriptions potential alternatives for the province to enhance laws.

A report by the Forest Practices Board says that at the very least a 3rd of the general public complaints it has acquired since 1995 have concerned the potential for forestry and vary practices to have an effect on water, together with consuming water, the integrity of ecosystems, in addition to public infrastructure and personal property.

It says that whereas the board often discovered forest licensees had been in compliancewith provincial legal guidelines, gaps in authorized necessities imply that forestry actions, together with harvesting and the development of forest service roads, can contribute to the danger of landslides, flooding and different water-related issues downstream.

The report launched Wednesday says there are not any authorized necessities to contemplate the cumulative results of forestry, or different industries and growth in most B.C. watersheds.

It additionally says the general public doesn't have ample alternatives to supply enter on forestry practices that have an effect on water-related dangers.

The report outlines how the province may enhance forest administration by making water a core worth in forest planning, making a authorized requirement to handle cumulative effectsin watersheds and renewing watershed restoration efforts to cut back the impacts of historic logging.

Kevin Kriese, chair of the Forest Practices Board, says local weather change can compound the consequences of human actions, together with forestry, on watersheds.

The creation of a brand new watershed safety technique together with B.C.’s local weather adaptation technique and the “modernization” of forestry laws by adjustments proposed final fall present a “uncommon alternative” to enhance the regulation of forest practices to raised defend water, Kriese says in a press release.

The B.C. authorities introduced Tuesday that it’s creating a brand new technique to guard watersheds and consuming water in response to threats posed by local weather change mixed with the consequences of city and industrial growth.

A provincial dialogue paper notes that the removing of vegetation from watersheds to permit for city development, or by industries resembling forestry and mining, can contribute to flooding and hurt consuming water sources and ecosystems.

Present forestry laws largely give attention to managing water on a site-by-site foundation, and necessities to handle the cumulative results of business on the broader watershed degree are in place for lower than 10 per cent of the province, Kriese says.

The place there are not any authorized necessities on the watershed degree, licensees have discretion to contemplate the cumulative results of logging on water, and whether or not any risk-mitigation measures are essential, the board’s report notes.

In lots of elements of B.C., “a number of licensees with totally different threat tolerances function on the identical space of public forest land,” it says. “With out clearly established targets, a call made by one licensee to mitigate threat may very well be undone by one other.”

The report says enacting new necessities for licensees to handle cumulative results on the watershed degree may operate as a “bridge” to finally finishing forest panorama plans beneath a brand new system proposed by the province final fall.

The system developed in partnership with First Nations, native communities and others would prioritize forest well being, changing present plans developed largely by the forest business, Forests Minister Katrine Conroy stated on the time.

— by Brenna Owen in Vancouver

This report by The Canadian Press was first revealed Jan. 26, 2022.