Français

News

Reclaiming the Forbidden Forest

Conservation Council of New Brunswick Presents Roundtable Discussion on the Practice, Challenges and Opportunities of Community Forestry in New Brunswick

Fredericton - The Conservation Council of New Brunswick invites the public to a roundtable discussion on community forestry: “Reclaiming the Forbidden Forest: The Practice, Challenges and Opportunities of Community Forestry in New Brunswick” at 7pm, Wednesday, January 24, at Renaissance College, 811 Charlotte Street, Fredericton.

The event will bring together the collective wisdom of woodlot owners,First Nations, community forestry proponents and practitioners in the province, and those studying examples of community forestry across New Brunswick and Canada.

"For the last few years I have been researching community forests in order to find out what is actually happening on the ground. Through contact with community forests across the country and in-depth study of four of these, I have collected a rich database of information about the characteristics, orientations and challenges faced by community forests from coast to coast," stated Sara Teitelbaum, a PhD candidate in the Faculty of Forestry and Environmental Management at the University of New Brunswick who will be speaking at the event.

The roundtable discussion will feature the following speakers: Andrew Clark, Director of the Carleton-Victoria Forest Products Marketing Board and Woodlot Owner; Brad Paul, St. Mary’s First Nation; David Coon, Policy Director, Conservation Council of New Brunswick; Frank Carroll, Mayor of McAdam; Jean Arnold, Falls Brook Centre; Sara Teitelbaum, PhD candidate in the Faculty of Forestry and Environmental Management at the University of New Brunswick; Susan Machum, Canada Research Chair on Rural Social Justice at St. Thomas University; and Tom Beckley, Faculty of Forestry and Environmental Management at the University of New Brunswick.

Clearcutting on New Brunswick's crown land continues at levels deemed socially unacceptable by the public. Meanwhile, New Brunswickers are ineligible for a license to cut wood from our public land, and private woodlot owners struggle to compete against the public wood cut by private multinationals. Rural communities in New Brunswick desperate to revitalize their economies as waves of people move to Alberta for work have no legal access to the public timber resources that surround them.

“We, woodlot owners, are living through some of the most difficult times of the last quarter century. The betrayal of woodlot owner interests in favour of large transnational corporations, by successive goverments means we only have ourselves and smaller local industries the we can depend on to build for the future,” stated Andrew Clark.

The recent Supreme Court decision which unanimously upheld the Aboriginal and communal right of native people to log Crown lands for domestic purposes may open the door for a new model of forest management in New Brunswick.

Community forestry has evolved from small isolated projects into an institutionalized approach of many public forestry programs around the world in the last two decades. The community forestry approach is built on bridging sustainable livelihoods with healthy forests.

-30-

Français