MAKE KNOWN YOUR PLANS

"If you aim to build a structure which will not be completed for a century, logic dictates that you set forth guidelines and make known your plans for those who will follow."  1968,John C. Jackson

 John C. Jackson, was one of the founders of Your Forests and its first editor.

In August 1882 the American Forestry Congress meeting was held for the first time in Canada. Many Canadians participated. It was following this conference that R.W. Phipps of Toronto was assigned by the Ontario government to prepare a report on the forests of Ontario. His report, the first of its kind in Canada, entitled Necessity of Preserving and Replanting Forests was issued in 1883. ( Your Forests Volume 15, No. 1, Winter 1983 , C.F.Coons Historical Perspective of Private Woodlands, pages 29-35)

Northern Ontario had 6.4 million acres of privately owned woodlands, but 2.4 million acres of those were owned by five large corporate owners. Even considering that, these were still over 200,000 woodland owners in the province of Ontario in 1968.




Now



Then

In 1886 the first fuelwood survey in Ontario found that production in 1881 had been 5.4 million cords. Now by 1910 southern Ontario was having to burn coal because of the scarcity of wood. Southern Ontario was into agriculture in a big way. Economic factors are important when landowners make decisions about their woodlands. "Short term economics have not been beneficial to long term forest management."

Forest Tenure 1950 style

The Lanark Forest Cooperative, unique in Ontario, was formed in 1950. There were about one hundred members. This Cooperative served mainly as a marketing agency for its members. Pulpwood, saw logs and veneer logs were marketed by the agency for a fee set by the organization. The Cooperative was totally funded by memberships and marketing fees.

Forest Tenure 2011

Dubreuilville lost its wood allocation.  A Saw Mill-town for 50 years.

Atikokan Forest Products Sapawe sustainable forest licence (SFL) cancelled by the province. A sawmill for 40 years.

September 9, 2011, Thunder Bay Chronicle Journal headline - " Sawmills On Auction Block'. Unless there is a private sale by September 26th ALL ASSETS will go to the highest bidder on September 27/28.

They almost had a buyer this summer but it fell through because the Province would not guarantee an adequate wood supply from Crown Lands.  They had lined up 330,000 cubic metres from private land and only needed another 170,000 cubic metres from the Crown to seal the deal. Couldn't be done. Yet for those forty years of operation  the sawmill was using up to 500,000 cubic metres on an annual basis from the Sapawe Forest Crown Land.

And in the East: The Mayors of Timmins, Kapuskasing, Cochrane and Iroquois Falls Speak Out.

"We the Mayors cannot live with this kind of process."

Timmins Times: "Under the MNR plan, up to 25% of the available land for harvesting, that forest would be off the market for a ten year period beginning April 1, 2012. That figure would rise to 65% of the forest off limits in 20 years time." http://timminstimes.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=3290730

2011 International Boreal Conservation Science Panel, page 6, Keeping Woodland Caribou in the Boreal Forest: Big Challenge, Immense Opportunity.  Their idea of Scale - the whole landscape.  "Conserving caribou means tempering societal expectations, particularly in the short term."  The true alternatives to them are , "short term gain versus continued long term prosperity."

Where is the long term prosperity if your town has no mill?

Species At Risk

"We really feel that we the human species is going to become extinct." Timmins Mayor Tom Laughren.

Cutting area to be slashed in World-renowned, managed, certified, forest.

"It's only a matter of time before similar cuts take place in other major forest units across the North, and indeed in other areas of the boreal forest across Canada." Iroquois Falls Mayor, Gilles Forget.

This could be the Beginning of the End

"Kapuskasing Mayor, Al Spacek, said he was concerned that the Abitibi Forest proposals are just the beginning and that the MNR may have long term plans for shutting down other forest across the North."

"How can the municipal leaders of this area not be privy to something so catastrophic to their way of life 20 to 30 years down the road? Cochrane Mayor, Peter Politis.

"The MNR must be deliberately ignoring the Crown Forest Sustainability Act which states that the social and economic impacts of forest management planning must be taken into account." Cochrane Mayor, Peter Politis.