Forest and range planning is focused
around ensuring health forests and range lands for British Columbians. Currently planning for forest operations and
range use (cattle grazing) on Crown forest lands is governed by the Forest Practices Code
(FPC) of B.C. Act. The Code applies to
approximately 85 percent of the land base in the province. It does not apply to private land unless
that land is within a tree farm or woodlot licence, issued under the Forest Act. The Ministry of Forests
administers the Code. The Code had a
number of planning processes that could help to better protect aquatic resources.
The
provincial government has begun a series of changes to the Code and its
regulations, in order to implement what it calls a “results-based” forest and range practices regime. This will eventually result in the new Forest and Range Practices Act replacing the Code, which should occur by April 2005. Under this “new regime” the government sets
objectives and outcomes that it wants to see in the forests or on range lands,
and forest companies and range users propose strategies and plans of how they
intend to meet those objectives. The
forest companies are accountable for those results and strategies. This approach has been strongly criticized
by the environmental community as decreasing responsibility for preventing
environmental harm before it occurs, while at the same time being less
enforceable than the current Code.
Both Acts provide for “landscape”
and “site” level operational plans (plans saying how the required results will
be met):
·
Landscape Level Plans –
Called Forest Development Plans under the current Code and Forest Stewardship
Plans under the Forest and Range Practices Act, Landscape Level Plans indicate
where (at least roughly) cutting will occur.
For landscape level plans involving range use of Crown Land see the
Guide’s page on Range Use Plans.
·
Site Level Plans –
Called Silviculture Prescriptions under the current Code and site level plans
under the Forest and Range Practices Act, Site Level Plans indicate how cutting
will be carried out in a particular cutblock.
In addition, the government is
currently encouraging industry to develop voluntary Sustainable
Forest Management Plans which help to identify the overall
goals of cutting and coordinate land use over a larger area.
In
addition, broad level social goals for forestry can be set through strategic
planning led or approved by the provincial
government. While the operational plans
mandated by the Forest Practices Code focus on how to implement the
government’s goals, strategic planning identifies the values that society wants
to see reflected in logging or range use on public lands. The Forest Practices Code does allow
strategic plans to be made legally enforceable by being designated as “Higher
Level Plans”.
Related
Guide Pages:
·
Landscape Level Plans
·
Site Level Plans
·
Range Use Plans
·
Forest Land and Old Growth
·
Forest Practices Code
·
Forest Act
·
Forestry
For more information about Forest
and Range Planning:
·
Ministry of Forests website and its Forest
Practices Code Transition Training website.
·
Sierra Legal Defence Fund (SLDF). 1997. Stream Protection Under the Code: The
Destruction Continues. Vancouver, BC: SLDF.
·
West Coast Environmental Law’s Guide to Forest Land Use Planning.
