This special report takes a look at the results of Board audits under the Forest and Range Practices Act and the Wildfire Act over the last seven years, specifically focusing on forestry roads and bridges. For all compliance audits carried out between 2005 and 2011, most roads and bridges met the requirements of the Forest and Range Practices Act, but a surprisingly large number did not, especially since 2009.
More than 55 percent of the issues found in audits since 2005 involve roads and bridges. The other 45 percent involve regenerating harvested sites, reporting information to government, and a few findings involved soil disturbance, protection of fish streams and range practices. This report focuses on road and bridge practices because poorly constructed or maintained roads and bridges create the highest risk to the environment and to safety for road users.
This bulletin describes the need to manage the cumulative effects of natural resource development in British Columbia. It is one of a series of five Forest Practices Board bulletins describing important issues for forest management identified in recent Board work.
This bulletin describes the benefits to the BC public of having the Forest Practices Board provide independent oversight of forest and range practices. It is one of a series of five new Forest Practices Board bulletins describing important issues for forest management identified in recent Board work.
The term NSR has been used by some to describe all of the forests where there might not be a ‘satisfactory’ number and type of trees. Areas harvested by the forest industry (including by the government-run BC Timber Sales program) meet these criteria for NSR because trees have been removed and there is a legal obligation to restock after harvesting. However, reduced timber supply caused by the mountain pine beetle is also something government must look at in terms of reforestation.
The investigation found that progress has been made in planning and implementing old-growth retention: thousands of old-growth management areas (OGMAs) have been established, and, in areas where OGMAs do not exist, specified amounts of old-growth forest must always be available.
The Board saw good examples of the professional reliance and Forest and Range Practices Act delegation models working – some licensees identify non-legal OGMAs in their forest stewardship plans, and conduct forest practices to protect those areas, even though they are not legally obligated to do so.
However, the investigation also highlighted some of the challenges licensees face in achieving old-growth retention on multi-tenured Crown forested land bases where some tenured users are required to maintain old-growth and others are not. The Board believes that old-growth retention requirements, as well as requirements for other values (e.g., wildlife habitat areas), should apply regardless of which industrial sector is developing the land.
