Reforestation opens up for Natives

Page 17

Private industry and government are encouraging Alberta Natives to play

a larger role in the provinces's reforestation industry. The Alberta

Pacific Forest Industries decision to award all of this year's planting

contract -- two million seedlings -- to Native contractors, is an

example of how private industry has taken the lead now that government

funds are mostly exhausted.

Overall, reforestation programs in Alberta this year call for

75-million seedlings to be planted across approximately 500 square

kilometres of logged-out forest sites. Private industry will plant about

80 per cent of the seedlings and the Alberta Forest Service will oversee

the remaining contracts. Increasingly, governments and private industry

are working with Alberta Native bands to boost Native participation in

the provinces's $64-million-a-year reforestation industry.

"The planting season is very short -- a few weeks in the spring and

fall are the only times seedlings will take to their new environments

--and this has made it difficult for industry to maintain a reliable

work force," explained Doug Schultz, silviculture forester at the forest

management division of Alberta Environmental Protection. "The Forest

Resource Improvement Program recognizes the need for an experienced,

year to year, work force. Ideally, communities local to the cut blocks

will supply the manpower."

Intense competition from established reforestation contractors is an

obstacle to fledgling Native operations. To help people who live

closest to the logging sites compete, government and private industry

are investing in training, start-up contracts and equipment.

The biggest contribution from government was the 1992 Canada-Alberta

Partnership Agreement in Forestry. Designed to promote sustainability

in Alberta forests, the agreement sponsored training programs in all

reforestation operations and planted 500,000 seedlings on Alberta

reserves.

Driftpile, Alta., hosted several of these reforestation programs.

"Three years ago there were few skilled people to do the planting,"

said Peter Freeman, project co-ordinator. "We got the training and did

the management planning and now there are more than 40 band members who

took part in the programs. Some of these people have got jobs in the

industry. We are now bidding on contracts because there is a work

force.

"The government started on the right track and then pulled the rug from

under us, just as members were seeing the positive impact of

regeneration and getting knowledge of the importance of maintaining

forest inventories," said Freeman. The partnership agreement ended March

31, 1995, and the lack of a replacement program has frustrated him.

AlPac has increased Native participation by providing five reserves

around their pulp mill in Grassland, Alta., with planting contracts and

equipment to do the planting. Also AlPac is sponsoring a two-month

training course in Wabasca for up to 25 students. The course will

include a two-week planting component.

"This type of training is expensive," according to Richard Ouellet,

AlPac's assistant silviculturist. "But if the training is successful in

Wabasca, it will be circulated to other communities in the future.

About 60 people will be required to plant the two-million trees this

year."

"Before industry and the federal government became interested in

training, the forest service looked after it by awarding small,

non-competitive contracts to interested parties. The practice has not

been used much in the last few years but it is still in place.

"A forester or forestry technician will go out to the planting site

with the contractors and get them going by demonstrating the planting

methods required to meet standards,"Schultz explained.

According to Schultz the cost of this system is low because training

contracts are carved out of programs that are already funded. In the

past, several of these 50-hectare training contracts have gone to bands

that inquired about training.

"Uner the new system, the regional silviculturist has been empowered

to designate training plots to interested parties," Schulz said. "If an

interested party is considered to be a serious prospect for competitive

bidding in the future then, subject to budget limitations, a training

plot can be put aside," Schultz confirmed that bands are considered

prime candidates for contracts.

Planting accounts for less than a quarter of the cost involved in

reforestation. Most of the money goes to equipment costs on site

preparations and approximately one quarter is spent on stand tending,

the last step in reforestation. It is comprised of restricting

competing plants from growing too close to saplings.

Marin Auger, owner of Muskwa Reforestation in Slave Lake, Alta., is one

of many Native reforesters to bid successfully in competitions for

contracts. Auger's company completed several stand tending contracts

last year.

"I hire Native people," Auger said. "Twenty-five or more for this

year. It is good going for a Native person. There is low

responsibility and good pay if you work hard."