Obtaining access in projects that work
Huge data demands to meet in forestry management
Obtaining access in projects that work
By Malcolm McColl
Activity around Merritt, BC is transforming the home of the patient Nlaka'pamux people, and they are engaged in the transformation.
Lennard Joe owns Grizzly-Man Resource Management Ltd., a forestry management company in Merritt. "We have leased space next door to Stuwix Resource Joint Venture, beside Johnny's on the Rez," a UPPI outlet and business park owned by Don Moses and Johnny Jackson.
Len Joe said, "I started Grizzly-Man Resource Management in 1999 as a sole proprietor and moved it into a limited company in 2002. Since the start of my company we have been mainly operating at a landscape level, but with the recent mountain pine beetle epidemic and also the increase of First Nations access to timber, we are planning to go provincial being professional and independent foresters."
Joe said, "A First Nation background creates a different picture of what the forest would be. The IFPA (Innovative Forest Practice Agreement) in Merritt is different from all others in the province. In the Cascade Forest District 50 percent of the uplift volume was given to the First Nation, and the other 50 percent that went to industry must have 50 percent of it in First Nations contracts."
Lennard Joe operates in select company, that is, few privately-held First Nation companies exist. "There are some Band-owned companies but these are run by councils and not privately-owned. I plan to retire with my company. We have the option to work with more than one Band, which is helping our company come closer to a universal vision of what First Nations forestry really is."
He works on a provincial level, with the BC Mountain Pine Beetle Working Group and assisting in provincial management strategies; also works at the national level to create First Nation access to timber resources, "We have great diversity and forestry exposure across the country, but the responsibility comes back to the company that harvests the timber." Grizzly-Man managed 500,000m3 of harvest in the Merritt TSA this year.
He joined a group of others to provide a professional First Nation perspective at the Canadian Forest Service. "It is about creating access, and also part of what we do is see a forestry project through and make it work. We have a list, a small list, of First Nations ready to manage forestry programs that would sustain themselves. The key is to promote education, and Grizzly-Man will strengthen that vision and push for inherent right through the education process."
Joe received his degree from University of BC and recently the designation of Registered Professional Forester (RPF). "It was a long trip, then as soon as you leave school and come back to the community you become 'the expert'. One very good thing about the Nicola Valley," he said, "is that we have First Nation professionals around."
Phillippe Batini is Band Manager at Upper Similkameen Indian Band, an Okanagan group allied with Nlaka'pamux forestry. "Forestry is our number one economic generator. We can log all winter. At USIB we do everything in the forests," with four operational divisions." Phillippe said, "Our logging division did 210,000m3 this year."
He said, "We operate in a flat plateau, good, dry pine forest. Our logging is big. We are one of the few First Nations hiring, somewhere between 30 and 50 people, working in stand-tending, pruning, spacing, tree planting," and other operations of forest licenses in Canada. He said USIB has a substantial investment in machinery, "We own 22 pieces of equipment. We have the people working, and want more Band members involved. It doesn't have to be overnight. We are showing more success with the younger members. This business is intensely monitored for safety. It's not like the old days."
Batini has brought USIB operations into the modern forestry economy, which is capital intensive, time sensitive, and managed for a trade-based commodity heavily underwritten, financed, and monitored.
"Every USIB division has its own safety manual. I'm not even supposed to go out there, and I'm the general manager."
Batini lamented that silviculture operations in BC have been curtailed, (Tree Farm Licenses still contain replantation obligations). The labour intensive maintenence of forests has been scaled back. He called it a philosophical bent of the current government to accept science that is laissez-faire about reforesting ranges.
"Silviculture was the best job for First Nations, they performed well in that area of forestry, and it's gone." Tree planting remains, "800 trees a day to make any money," plus the jobs in logging and road-building. USIB offers professional development services in forestry. Batini said, "We have RPFs and planning and layout personnel to work for small licensees. We are in the forest from the cruising (timber surveys), to block layouts, permits, logging and planting."
Soon they will market furniture from the forests in a furniture factory and mill in the city of Princeton. "We started with one skidder 12 years ago. We had $30,000 and a banker. No grants. No time to do it." Today they operate under a Forest Practices Agreement with Stuwix Resources Joint Venture, a forestry company assembled by Chief Dave Walkem and Phillippe Batini.
Batini shared his huge admiration for Golden Antoine (just recently passed away), and Chief Percy Joe, Lennard Joe's dad and close mentor. Batini said, "The old generation were good supporters of their youth."
Chief David Walkem, RPF, from Cooks Ferry Indian Band is President of Stuwix Resources Joint Venture. Stuwix are recognized as ancient people preceding both Okanagan and Nlaka'pamux. Chief Walkem said, "As Okanagan and Nlaka'pamux people working together, this is the first time we’ve done anything on this scale." They have eight Bands, six Nlaka'pamux, and two Okanagan, operating the joint venture.
He said, "It's going well. We are licensed for 515,000 m3/yr, with six Native logging crews of ten per crew working this year. We have First Nation contractors developing cutting permits. We are starting a silviculture program." The company has a small office and encourages First Nation contractors, "We run a program that reaches Bands with opportunities in logging, forest management, silviculture, business administration, archaeological and traditional use studies."
Chief Walkem said, "Ten years ago we had nothing, although we did have plenty of working knowledge in modern forestry. We always had experienced loggers and forest managers , but what we lacked is the opportunity to work in the local forest industry or operate our own businesses. In the last 10 years culminating in Stuwix, First Nations in the area are operating as fully modern, fully functional loggers, forest technicians, and other natural resources professionals."
Chief Walkem obtained a forestry science degree in 1985. He said the situation has changed after 20 years of having the Nicola Valley Institute of Technology in Merritt, a First Nation post-secondary institute with a natural resource department training technicians.
"In Merritt, TSA forest licensees must absorb First Nation personnel," he said. "This employment agreement has been working for four years."
At Stuwix, "We are involved in an 'Innovative Forest Practices Agreement' (IFPA) along with four other licencees. We manage 240,000 m3/yr under the IFPA agreement - this was promised to be replaceable by the province but has not occurred yet. In addition, we manage 275,000 m3/yr under a MPB uplift in an effort to help control the spread of the MPB in our area. This last volume is not renewable."
Huge data demands to meet in forestry management
By Malcolm McColl
Forestry managers and entrepreneurs face serious calls to account when they work in forests as industrial players, owners and managers. First Nations often place higher demands on themselves than the outside world might normally expect. First Nations will add cultural, archeaological, and environmental data about their traditional territories and they are finding forestry planning software to be an essential tool.
Many forestry companies use software developed and marketed by D.R. Systems, in Nanaimo, BC. The company's Phoenix Pro software application helps foresters plan the location and shape of timber harvest blocks and all the silvicutural treatments to be applied to the block once it has been harvested. The software assists in all required planning, budgeting and reporting for timber development through block selection to subsequent 'Free-to-Grow' status (the point at which a new forest stand has been successfully established and is sufficiently old enough or the trees are tall enough to expect normal future stand development).
It takes years for a forestry company to meet obligations under Crown Land liability issues, and "years until silviculture and habitat biodiversity requirements are met," said Don Reimer, not an inexpensive proposition. In fact, anybody who is licensed to harvest on Crown Land must be well qualified to do the job. (Forestry ops on private land are reported but the rules are different. Private land is less than 10 percent of the BC forest landbase, for example, but much higher in New Brunswick.).
Reimer and his staff designed software to address demands for reports that fulfill government regulations, and supply operators with insight from information and knowledge with current dates. He said, "We initially wrote the software over 20 years ago and have continually updated and added to it since the release of Version 1 in 1985." They are now on Version 6.
He said, "The learning curve in the use of the software takes a few days, with most users running important parts of it in a short time." The terminology found on screen is familiar to professional foresters. The software is simple to install from CD and a help desk is available.
"Maintenance agreements keep software current and keep data in line with changing government regulations, and the program is a tool designed to electronically file all required reports with relevant government agencies or deartments," he said. D.R. Systems developed strategic and tactical planning tools in off-the-shelf PC software, including a Strategic Planning Tool called OPTIONS that incorporates specialty data like First Nation traditional knowledge, Aboriginal Rights and Title areas, other traditional territory issues, and archeological information.
Reimer is linking forestry business to advanced technology, he said, "I am a former MacBlo guy, and when I left to go private they were one of my first clients. They helped us design the product style that would benefit themselves and their clients. We have a partner in Vancouver called Atticus Spatial Environmental Management Systems, who provides GIS services that work with Phoenix and the rest of our software. We also have a second partner, Techniscope Industries, who handle the web-based side of our services. There is a global market for this stuff."
The application helps First Nations operating forestry programs throughout Canada through various stages of self-governance. "Our suite of tools incorporates all the principles of traditional cultural knowledge, archeaology and bio-diversity and use, that applies to tradtional use. We have designed the software to provide tools to resolve (modern era) concerns and satisfy the interests of all parties in the land-use business." He intended the planning software to be useful for negotiators who are making land use decisions.
"Our software, OPTIONS, provides a strategic planning framework that incorporates local social, cultural, and economic forecasts. It derives land management scenarios which can benefit all users of natural resources. Such solutions give foresters more cash, provide more jobs, and saves and improves habitat." First Nations like it. In BC alone, Phoenix is used by Stuwix, Adams Lake, IISAAK Forest Resources, Nisga'a, Ulkatcho's company West Chilcotin Forest Products, and others.
A separate program for central data management also gves the operator a central, Multi-Resource Inventory System that interfaces with OPTIONS as the planning tool, then Phoenix enables the forester to work out the operational details. Everything is on PCs and includes links to GIS systems, to corporate database sites, and to handheld field units as well as interactive links via the internet to a wide range of stakeholders.
Reimer said, "Field data collected via our handheld software (for PDAs and specialty ruggedized handheld data collection units) can be used both for collection of field data as well as downloading geographic and other ground-source data to an on-site user via the internet. All of these programs are designed to operate individually or as part of a suite of complementary tools. In that way we can work with and incorporate a client's existing software into a better solution for the client."