Whereas the forest industry in British Columbia has been on a steady decline in recent decades, with dozens mill closures, thousands of lost jobs and once-thriving rural communities experiencing severe economic decline due in large part to corporate mismanagement, misguided government policies, and lack of public oversight; And whereas many communities across British Columbia and globally have demonstrated that when local people are empowered to manage public forests and other common resources through community forest licenses, regional trusts and other community-based governance models, there are significant social, economic and environmental benefits: Therefore be it resolved that the Province of British Columbia explore the feasibility of: - Adopting a new model of regionally-based forestry management that will empower local communities to engage in long term planning of the regional economies and ecosystems; - Creating a Forest Charter passed by the Legislature that includes an overall vision, sustainability principles, and standards for our forests; and - Appointing a Forester General to serve as a new independent officer who will report annually to the Legislature and work with the diverse regions of our province on local land planning processes.
Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development Government has initiated the exploration of new forest policy under the Interior Forest Sector Renewal Initiative launched spring 2019. In April 2019 the Premier challenged CEOs of major forest companies to form a Timber Supply Area TSA level coalition with First Nations, labour representatives and local community leaders to work together to provide ideas on future forest policy that would maintain the global competitiveness, provide resilience for communities, reconcile with First Nations and increase participation in the forest sector and maintain our stewardship excellence. In addition, the Ministry has held 35 separate engagement sessions across the Interior to gather feedback and ideas on potential future forest policy. We also had a website open to gather feedback from the interested public. This feedback will be developed into a What We Heard report which will result in policy options coming forward to government for consideration. More local management and control of forest management was a common theme in the feedback received.