Category Archives: Forests

Forests, Indigenous Nations

Clayoquot Sound’s only tree farm licence subdivided into three lots to assert First Nations’ land visions

Editor’s note: In 1993, Tzeporah Berman and Kairn Mahon Carrington were leaders of the Clayoquot Protests. They now live on Cortes Island.

By Nora O’Malley, Ha-Shilth-Sa, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Clayoquot Sound, BC – The logging tenure for a landscape made famous by the “War in the Woods” protests on the west coast of Vancouver Island has been divided up into three new Tree Farm Licences (TFL) to assert First Nations’ unique land-use visions. 

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Forests, Indigenous Nations

Tla’amin Nation set to reclaim forest stewardship with $80M logging licence deal: ‘A generational opportunity’

IndigiNews, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Tla’amin Nation set to take back control over a large piece of its territory, after signing a deal to take over a company’s licence to log more than 1,540 square kilometres of forest in their homelands.

The nation agreed to buy the tree-farm license for the massive parcel — about 13 times larger than the City of Vancouver — from Western Forest Products for $80 million on Feb. 19.

The license for the Stillwater Forest Operation covers a vast majority of forest in the qathet (Powell River) area, where Tla’amin is located. 

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Forests

2026 Spring Cut in the Cortes Community Forest

Work is about to resume in the Cortes Community Forest. 

Mark Lombard, General Manager for the Cortes Forestry General Partnership, explained, “The spring cut is going to happen in the Coulter Bay area of the community forest. We’ll probably start a small segment of road in about three weeks. While the road is being built, maybe a month from now, we’re going to move over to Larsen’s Meadow. They’re both relatively small projects.”

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Forests, Indigenous Nations, Tourism

Could shifting gears from forestry to tourism pay the bills?

By Nora O’Malley, Ha-Shilth-Sa, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Jordan River, B.C. – At the mouth of Jordan River in Pacheedaht First Nation territory on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, the tide is pushing. Heat from a February sun warms the face as sets of friendly waves roll in under the backdrop of the Olympic Mountains. Parking at the day-use area of this regional park is squeezed on this fine Friday away from the screen. 

A tugboat called Miss Jordan cruises by a bob of surfers, dragging a line of thick rope towards a raft of floating logs, otherwise known as a log boom. Some of the surfers catch a wave towards the cobble shoreline and exit the water.

“They’ll run right over us if we don’t get out of the way,” says a stand-up paddler. 

“But it is a nice day for it,” he concedes.

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Forests

The State of Campbell River’s Forestry Sector

Forestry has been one of the three economic pillars of Campbell River. In the article that follows, Mayor Kermit Dahl states that ’70% of what the city does is resource-related, and their sales in the previous year were down by just over 20%.’ While many do not agree with the industry practise of cutting big tree old growth – the iconic subset which often comes to mind when hearing the words ‘old growth’ – there is much more to the story. The following article consists of select gleanings from statements made by Mayor Dahl and several MPs (including Aaron Gunn) at a recent meeting of the federal government’s Standing Committee on Natural Resources. 

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