Environment Committee on Nov. 22nd, 2018

[Tony Lemprière]

At this moment, I think in 2017 it's about 750,000 hectares.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

How much of the forest right now is infested with the pine beetle or the spruce budworm?

[Beth MacNeil]

Werner, do you know the stats?

[Dr. Werner Kurz]

The cumulative impact of the mountain pine beetle in British Columbia is just over 17 million hectares, but that's not in a single year. This is the whole outbreak cycle since about 2000. The statistics for the defoliators vary, and all of these are cyclical insects. The area affected by insects is far greater than the area affected by either harvest or by fires, but the intensity of the impact of either of these other human or natural disturbances is far greater because insects kill.... The defoliators reduce growth rates and kill some trees through multiple outbreaks or through multiple years of defoliation to a 30% to 50% mortality, whereas a wildfire typically kills 100% or nearly 100% of the trees.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Do we focus any of our efforts today on harvesting those areas that are impacted? How much of our resources today are focused on harvesting those specific areas?

[Dr. Werner Kurz]

Depending on where you are in the country, a significant fraction of the total harvest is always directed at recovering losses from natural disturbances, fires and insects, but—

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

You have such a large area.

[Dr. Werner Kurz]

It is a significant fraction of the total harvest area, but what I said earlier is that the other areas are larger, so we can only capture part of it. The reason for this is that the insects and the fires occur both in the managed and the unmanaged forest, and even within the managed forest, we don't have roads to all of the areas affected by natural disturbances. It is always only a fraction that can be harvested.

I'll leave it at that.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

I wanted to feed off from that the importance of the $1.3 billion that is being invested into protected spaces. Could you maybe delve into that as far as not just how climate mitigation is concerned, but the health of the environment itself around sustainability of that environment and the biodiversity that exists when you have a protected space.

[Beth MacNeil]

I'll try to tackle that. It's not an easy question, but I have folks and some members of my team here, who are working.... I'm not going to answer the protected-area issue at large, but I do want to bring attention to an area such as B.C., and we provide a lot of expertise to ECCC on socio-economic analysis and economic valuation of our resources, whether they be timber resources or minerals, in support of something like the Species at Risk Act, if you're talking about biodiversity.

You may know that we're looking at the southern mountain caribou, about which Minister McKenna actually issued an imminent threat determination in early May, so we're working with our industry colleagues and with the Province of B.C. There are 10 local population units in B.C. and three in Alberta. There has to be a balance—that's what I would say—in identifying the right areas for biodiversity, how much the quality of those stands would contribute to the pan-Canadian framework on clean growth and climate change, while supporting the well-being of communities. We have 165 communities in Canada that are dependent on forestry.

There is a balance. I'm not answering your question directly, and I don't want to dismiss it, but there are a lot of factors and we take in all of these considerations to make the right decision in the public policy.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair]

We're going to go over to Mr. Stetski for three minutes. To give everybody a sense of timing, we'll have time to do a six-minute round for each side after Mr. Stetski's three minutes, so you can figure out who your next speakers are going to be.

[Wayne Stetski]

Thank you.

In my former life I was regional manager with the Ministry of Environment for southeastern British Columbia, responsible for provincial parks, fish and wildlife, and ecosystems. In that part of the world, grasslands and restoring grasslands was a major part of what we were doing, so we would cut down a lot of trees. You know, the difference between logging and ecosystem restoration is that we left all the biggest trees and took out all the smaller ones.

I have a couple of questions coming from that. We're still doing it today. The really rich ungulate populations, for example, that we have in my part of the world are due to grasslands more so than forested lands. That, of course, leaves thousands of slash-burning piles lined up around the landscape. Are there any funding incentives to do something with the slash piles other than just burning them on the land? What are those incentives? That is my first question.

John, I see you nodding. Did you want to take that?

[John Fox]

It's probably more appropriate for our forestry colleagues, but it's a big problem in agriculture all over.... What do you do with residue off field? We've been working with industry and looking for a whole bunch of different uses—making biopellets, different fuel sources, different ways in which we could leave the residual straw on the field for grazing purposes. In the west, a whole cropping livestock technique around swath grazing has emerged, where rather than clearing the field, you pile it up and let the cattle out on it, and then they can use that as a food source during the winter months.

Yes, it is a big issue. In some cases we're even looking at harvesting it and taking it for further processing, so there may be some value in extracting components from that, which could then be used for different bioproducts as substitutes for petroleum.

[Wayne Stetski]

Is there specific funding, though, if somebody wants to set up a bioenergy plant out in our rural ridings?

[John Fox]

We do bioproducts, but they do a lot more in the bioenergy field.

[Beth MacNeil]

Thanks, and I'm going to turn to Anne-Hélène to give you the names of the two programs and the funds that are available.

I actually had Susan Yurkovich in my office earlier this afternoon, the CEO of the Council of Forest Industries in B.C., and we were talking about the cost of transporting and removing those slash piles from the forests. The truth of the matter is, I think, that first of all there are associated consequences with forest fires, frequency and magnitude of forest fires, but if we actually harvest those residues it can help spur the bioeconomy in bioproducts. There is a value, or they can be turned into an economic value in bioproducts and biofuels.

Anne-Hélène, could you describe the two programs, please?

[Anne-Hélène Mathey, Director, Economic Analysis Division, Canadian Forest Service, Department of Natural Resources]

There is one program that is not ours. It's Environment Canada's program, the low-carbon economy fund, which has dedicated significant funds. Our assistant deputy minister mentioned some $200 million—

[Wayne Stetski]

Was that the low-carbon economy fund?

[Anne-Hélène Mathey]

Yes. The low-carbon economy fund dedicated significant monies to improving management practices when provinces came up with such program requests. In particular, some of these practices involve a better utilization of the forest fibre harvested, leaving a lot less on site. That's about forest practices.

Maybe if you want to add, you can.

[Vincent Ngan]

Sure. As you know, the low-carbon economy fund is a $2-billion fund, with the majority being dedicated to supporting territories and provinces, putting forward priority programs. Organics diversion is one area that can be supported. In addition to supporting provinces and territories, there is also a merit-based process called the champion fund that has $500 million, with $450 million of that being dedicated to asking not just provinces and territories, but also private sector and not-for-profit organizations, to put forward their best ideas. We launched that earlier this year. So far we have already received submissions and we're in the process of weighing in and assessing to see which ones actually will receive funding.

Last, but not least, $50 million, which we have not launched, will be set aside for smaller entities, be they indigenous communities, or small and medium-sized companies. This is one area that could benefit for-profit and small entities.

[Wayne Stetski]

Is that under the champion fund as well?

[Vincent Ngan]

That's correct.

[Wayne Stetski]

Thank you.

[The Chair]

Wayne, we're two minutes over. Do you want to just make this your six-minute round? You can finish off—