Media Clipping — Tuesday, March 5, 2002, The Halifax Herald

The great divide

Opinion

By Paul Schneidereit

TO SAY that environmentalists and industrial foresters are not on speaking terms took on a literal – and extremely unfortunate – new reality last week.

Last Tuesday, three groups pushing to reduce clearcutting in Nova Scotia's forests quit the only organization where environmentalists, industry, government and private woodlot owners directly discuss, together, the issues that concern them all.

The Nova Scotia Woodlot Owners and Operators Association, the Ecology Action Centre and the forest caucus of the Nova Scotia Environmental Network pulled out of the Nova Forest Alliance – which calls itself a partnership in sustainable forest management – saying "the participation of our groups in the NFA has been misrepresented and co-opted for purposes that undermine the interests we represent."

The Eastern Shore Forest Watch Association withdrew from the NFA a month earlier for the same reasons.

"The NFA has shown no evidence that it is genuinely interested in new knowledge and innovative tools to solve complex problems," the groups' resignation letter stated. "As was the case with the East Coast cod fishery 10 years ago, no one will forego economic benefits today for the sake of a secure future for succeeding generations."

A couple of events precipitated the fireworks.

First, a NFA forestry manual – meant to guide contractors and woodlot owners on best harvesting practices – went to print before environmentalists got all the changes to the document that they wanted.

When the Forest Products Association of Nova Scotia quickly adopted the NFA manual, environmentalists believed they'd been used to give industry something they needed to qualify for an internal certification program – a forest practices manual produced by an organization representing multiple stakeholders.

The groups also condemned the NFA's failure to embrace last fall's Genuine Progress Index (GPI) Forest Accounts report – which blasted past forest practices and outlined alternative methods to the high current level (almost 99 per cent) of clearcut harvesting – and published comments by NFA chairman Eldon Gunn attacking the GPI report's credibility.

Last, with the NFA seeking millions more in federal funding to continue its work, the dissenting groups want Natural Resources Canada to re-examine the alliance's make-up.

NFA and industry officials, while regretting the groups' decision, dispute the allegations.

Work on the forestry manual began well before industry was considering certification, they say. The Forest Products Association was working on its own manual, says executive director Steve Talbot, but adopted the NFA's to avoid duplication.

Meanwhile, on the GPI report, the NFA's chairman says that it is not the alliance's role to take "positions" or recommend government policy. Defending his own criticism of the report, Mr. Gunn said that he spoke as an academic who publicly critiques reports all the time.

The NFA did agree, by a Feb. 5 vote, to study the GPI report. Two environmental groups and a large woodlot owners group are still members of the alliance.

Enough with the details.

A great gulf still divides two groups with passionately differing views on the methods and meaning of sustainable forestry.

Leaving aside the detailed arguments put forward by the people I spent hours talking to last week – we'll consider them next week – what has happened is not in the public's or either side's best interests.

Hard-line attitudes on both sides are only strengthened. For environmentalists, that means greater demonizing of industry and government officials; for industry, a danger of recklessly dismissing real public concerns as environmental extremism.

Walking away now may feel right, but environmentalists and others who care about the forests need, in the long term, to be able to directly discuss these issues, on behalf of all citizens, with industry and government.

At the same time, the alliance – its membership clearly dominated by industry and government – must be seen to be truly willing to examine all views. When the NFA's chairman publicly blasts an environmental report he doesn't agree with, that message is hopelessly garbled.

Copyright © 2002, The Halifax Herald Limited