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By Ken Matthews, Forestry ManagerForestry & Engineering

Last year the Provincial government brought the Clayoquot Sound watershed plans under a Provincial land Use Order which made following these plans a legal requirement.  For the past several years, forest companies operating in Clayoquot Sound had been voluntarily following the plans.

The adoption of this legal order automatically meant that the holders of TFL 54 were obligated to put together a new Forest Stewardship Plan for the area. That new plan had to be submitted to the Ministry of Forests before June 26, 2009.  Ron Sorensen met the deadline this week and the plan is now with the Ministry of Forests for review and, hopefully, approval.   With this plan submission, we are able to continue to work in TFL 54 and submit new cutting permits and applications to build road based on the existing approved plan. Had we not met the deadline, we would not have been able to submit new permits or amend old permits for new harvesting or road construction.

The new plan is not significantly different from the old plan because we did have voluntary measures adopted in the existing plan.  Nevertheless, Ron had to proceed as if we were starting over and had to advertise the plan, make it available for public review, consult with affected First Nations and respond and make alterations to the plan based on comments received. Clayoquot Sound is a controversial place to work so we had many comments to respond to and deal with.

The new plan will cover operations for the next five years and is extendable, so this work will carry forward long into the future barring any major changes in forest management.

On the engineering side, we have ongoing work being undertaken on the Matleset plateau. We are hoping to have engineering and cruising complete on this area by late August so that we can submit a new cutting permit application for up to 60 00m3 which we will begin to harvest this fall.