🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1993Aug12.002812.24111@news.mentorg.com> jhurst@renfield.mentorg.com (Jim Hurst) writes:


>Yet there will always be an apologist for Business As Usual.  A pleasure
>to meet you, Robert.
_____________
You have a singular wit, Jim.

Jim makes many colorful statements:

>...will they [public lands] be used in an extractive mode, so that all
>amenities except fiber production are destroyed in the interest of short
>term economic benefits for a few, with even the capacity to produce fiber 
>is degraded?

>Now the Province faces a choice of maintaining (at considerable public
>subsidy) archaic and destructive practices of extractive industry, or
>making the commitment to a transition towards a value-added, knowledge
>intensive economy.  

>...other foresters are still harvesting huge blocks of native forest
>in unsustainable ways at unsustainable levels.
_____________
You speak with apparent anger of clearcutting as an "archaic and
destructive practice" as if it were a self evident truth, and offer the
defense:

>They ["people"] go out and look at the moonscape clearcutting leaves, and
>say, "This is OUR land, and they did THIS to it?!" and go home furious. 
>Stumps don't lie. ....They may not know the science, but they know what
>they like.

So how did I become an apologist for the status quo?  It seems that I
appear to question the rationale behind wholesale condemnation of
clearcutting as a silvicultural practice.  I have never argued that forest
practices are above question, nor do I intend to do so.  Jim goes on to say:

>To wax
>poetic about using maximally destructive forestry techniques for symbolic
>reasons rather blurs the issue, don't you think?  Myself, I think most
>_industries_, at least, are more motivated by economics than symbols.

OK, Jim.  Let's talk economics.

Forest land use issues are complicated in B.C since 96% of the Province is
public land.  As the Government of B.C. acts as agent for the Crown in
management of this land, it is the mandate of government to make land use
decisions.  Obviously, this method is and will continue to be a
confrontational one, as various and often conflicting interest groups
continue to attempt to pressure the government to implement their agendas.

One could really "wax poetic" about the history of resource allocation
strategies in the B.C. system.  It has been argued, I believe very
convincingly, that the forest resource has never been managed in such a
fashion as to return the maximum economic benefit to its owners,
regardless of who they have been.  B.C. policy has never provided forest
tenure holders with the security necessary to justify efficient forest
management in the long term.  The coastal BC forest is the most responsive
to intensive silvicultural investment;  investment that is not made on
public land for presicely the same reasons as Clayoquot or South Moresby. 
The government has demonstrated that investors in forest enterprises have
little reason to believe that over the long periods of discounting you
speak of they will see any return on their investments.

So it seems to me that a healthy approach in resolving land use conflicts,
as well as improving general or specific economic benefits, would be to
persue a policy of providing some true long term security in tenure to forest
companies in exchange for the surrender of some existing tenure agreements and
their conversion to other resource uses, such as recreation.  This would
likely be accomplished through the sale of legal title to Crown Land and
the establishment of park areas.


In bringing the subject back to clearcutting and Jim's colorful metaphors,
clearcutting can be both an economically and silviculturally efficient
system that does not unduly effect the potential for ecosystem recovery. 
Alternatively, as I stated in the post Jim has reacted to, there are
issues around clearcutting that deserve attention as well as many clear
examples where clearcutting results in disturbance that hampers tree,
plant, wildlife and microbe regeneration to an unacceptable degree.

Jim goes on to say:

>I maintain that clearcutting is a destructive, inappropriate management 
>technique for most public lands.  Would you be so kind as to explain to me 
>why this isn't so?

With the assistance of _Balancing_Act_ by Hamish Kimmins, and the
disclaimer that the ultimate choice of harvest method depends on the
management objectives being pursued, not the absolute tolerance of harvest
method, I provide the following points:

1.  The regeneration of some species of trees whose seedlings are poorly
tolerant of shade is generally much more successful in clearcuts than
partial cut systems.  Some tree species in some types of forest will
survive only in full sunlight.

2.  Clearcutting may provide for easie weed control, easier site
preparation for both planted and natural regeneration, and a greater
opportunity to control species mix.

3.  Clearcutting takes advantage of economies of scale and is often the
most economically efficient silvicultural system both in the long and
short term.  This system may provide the opportunity to recover initial
costs before discount rates have rendered them excessive.

4.  In terms of safety, clearcutting is considered easier and less
dangerous than many alternative harvest methods, especially in decadent or
windthrown forest stands composed of interfering stems and/or branches.

5.  As many of the negative environmental effects are caused by roads,
clearcutting, which allows for the use of skyline or other long reach
cable yarding methods, may result in fewer roads than ground based harvest
systems.

6.  Some plant and wildlife species acieve greater success under forest
conditions more closely resembling early seral states, which are
facilitated by harvest methods that remove the majority of standing timber.

7.  Some coastal forests, even on steep slopes, may suffer from reductions
or inhabition of tree growth due to excessive accumulations of acidic
materials in the forest floors that inhibit tree growth unless
significantly disturbed.

8.  Some coastal forests in areas of high rainfall may suffer from
chemical changes in the soil that restrict growth unless the soil is
sufficiently disturbed.

>>Forestry cycles are 75-150
>>years, and the change from undisturbed to disturbed less obvious.
>
>This length of the rotation is a significant difference.  One aspect is 
>the longer period an investment exposed to the discount rate:  if you
>choose to start from scratch, your investment gives no return for 75-150
>years.  So the economics of investing in a new crop are quite different
>in forestry.  Clearcutting not only damages the productive capacity of 
>the land, but it requires large amounts of capital exposed to the discount
>rate for long periods of time.  Or else is simply deforestry.  Regenerating
>clearcut sites can be most difficult, and is relatively expensive even on 
>forgiving sites.
>
>>I believe that the scientific arguments surrounding the selective logging
>>vs. clearcutting debate receive less attention because of the visibility
>>issue.  Minds have slammed shut around the concept that anything on such a
>>scale directed by man must be evil and functionally destructive.  
>
>I have a background in science, and try to keep an open mind.  I have a
>strong interest in forests, and have traveled a bit, and seen a few 
>interesting forests.  IMHO, clearcutting is too destructive a practice 
>to be the subject of government subsidy.  I will be happy to share, to my
>limited ability, arguments against clearcutting.




>We agree that environmental protection is a luxury.  But environmental
>degradation is most expensive to reverse.




>
>>I
>>acknowlege that there are many good, strong scientific arguments around
>>clearcutting issues that deserve attention, however in general the concept
>>is held to be inappropriate mainly because of an emotional reaction. 
>
>Hmm, a bit technocratic here, aren't we?  There are good sources of 
>scientific information about the emerging body of evidence indicting 
>clearcutting in everything from soil damage to fisheries depletion to
>halitosis and foot odor.  (Haha, made up those last two).
>
>Who are you to be objective about their emotional responses to public 
>policy?  Or are you arguing that public values should not be an important
>factor in public policy?
>
>>Clearcutting really symbolizes the man influencing the environment theme
>>because of its scale.  
>
>Clearcutting really symbolizes the destructive slash and burn agriculture
>of the ancient Maya, and is indeed a sublimated form of human sacrifice. 8^)
>
>Clearcutting really symbolizes the triumph of the Christians over the 
>bloodthirsty druids, and thus is a stern repudiation of human sacrifice. 8^)
>
>Geez, Robert, having a technical discussion will be easier if we can
>drop the semiotics.  Humans have influenced, and will continue to influence,
>the environment in dramatic and subtle ways, both good and bad.  To wax
>
>>If we were to selecively log, it is argued, we
>>would be influencing our environment less and this would be better.  The
>>issue as to whether clearcutting is a negative influence is passed over.
>
>Who's passing it over?  I have plenty of dirt on clearcutting:  it 
>represents an instant, irreversible commitment to a single silvicultural
>method that damages the soil, the water, much wildlife, requires expensive 
>intervention, and eliminates the recreational and spiritual use of the land.
>
>If we selectively log, we preserve many other forest amenities besides fiber, 
>while still producing saw timber.  Are you rejecting the values of non-fiber 
>amenities, or the rights of the public to preserve these amenities?
>
>>Hamish Kimmins once said that if foresters didn't do a better job of
>>getting their message out the management of forests would be shifted from
>>foresters to sociologists or geographers.  
>
>Actually, in the US, we're using more landscape ecologists, fish and 
>wildlife biologists, recreation planners, and restoration ecologists
>these days.  If forester == timber beast, well, good riddance.  In the
>past decade, foresters have done some serious damage to the public lands
>in the US, and their prestige and credibility is accordingly compromised.
>
>(Not to knock all foresters, I respect most with whom I have the 
>pleasure to be acquainted.) 
>
>If foresters can't manage public lands the way the public requires, then
>perhaps the public is better served by geographers managing their forests,
>at least the geographers I know would make the attempt to understand them
>before destroying them.
>
>>If people don't begin to appreciate their roots, the
>>root of the prosperity that they take for granted, and accept the rational
>>evaluation of issues rather than the emotional, our credit will run out and
>>the fears that people harbor will come to life.
>
>Let me see if I've got it:  "If we stop clearcutting, Terrible Things
>will happen."  Hmm, you know, the USDA Forest Service has been threatening
>us with Timber Famines for almost 100 years now, and somehow they just never
>seem to materialize.  Only a modest percentage of the US lumber supply 
>comes from public lands (~11%), yet they contain much of the water supply (esp.
>in the West), recreational potential and fish and wildlife habitat.
>
>
>					Cheers,
>
>					Jim Hurst
>
>>	"Clearcutting is not a crime."
>
>Perhaps that should be:
>
>	Clearcutting is not a crime.  In Canada.  Yet.
>
>	Eh?


-- 
Robert Froese  VE7MOQ
taganov biogeocoenose approach                  "Clearcutting is not a Crime"
taganov@unixg.ubc.ca