"We're looking for certainty," said Northern Rockies Mayor Rob Fraser...
The B.C. government is expediting reviews of wood supplies in the province's northeast, saying years of "catastrophic wildfires" and new Indigenous land and wildlife protections have caused "significant changes" to the region's forests.
Reviews of the Fort St. John and Fort Nelson areas will determine how much Crown timber is left for companies operating in the Fort St. John and Fort Nelson areas, and how much they'll be able to cut each year.
While the reviews come amid an escalating trade war with the United States and ongoing mill closures and job losses across the province, including the northeast, a local mayor and mill operator are welcoming their timing — even as they brace for potential cuts to existing timber licences.
"We're looking for certainty," said Northern Rockies Mayor Rob Fraser, who says he has been asking for the province for review for at least four years.
The municipality has been trying to kickstart a community forest in partnership with the Fort Nelson First Nation, he said.
"If we're looking for investors to come in, who may want to put a small or a large sawmill here, it's hard for us to say what that cut looks like."
Annual harvests were last set in Fort St. John in 2018 and in Fort Nelson in 2019. They had been scheduled for updates by the end of this decade.
However, both regions have witnessed some of the province's most destructive wildfires in recent years.
According to B.C. Wildfire statistics, more than 3 million hectares of forest has burned in both regions since 2018.
The 2023 Donnie Creek wildfire alone scorched more than 600,000 hectares, the largest fire recorded in B.C.'s history.
By comparison, nearly 1,400 wildfires have burned about 475,000 hectares so far this year, according to B.C. Wildfire.
"We know there will be [licence] cuts," said Fraser. "But this is still a really large forest district and we haven't been cutting here since 2009. I think we're pretty flush with harvestable forest."
Chief Forester Shane Berg's office could not provide figures of how much merchantable timber has been lost to wildfire, but said estimates will be provided during consultations with local communities and First Nations later this fall.
Timber supplies have also "experienced significant changes" from efforts to protect boreal caribou ranges near Fort Nelson while cutting permits and timber sales have been suspended in three new Indigenous designated areas near Fort St. John until 2030 and beyond.
Berg's office said new harvesting levels will be based on consultations as well as technical studies "and the government's social and economic objectives."
Tenure holders will get the chance to review and comment on any proposed licence volume reductions. "It is an independent, professional judgment," Berg's office said.
A spokesperson for Louisiana Pacific, which operates an OSB (oriented strand board) mill in Fort St. John, said the company supports a review.
Senior communications director Breeanna Beckham said provincial timber licences supply only a portion of wood required for its mill. The rest is supplemented by private purchases, she said.
"Outdated timber supply information has limited the Province's ability to issue additional licences," Beckham said.
"While we won't speculate on the outcome, we believe an updated assessment will provide greater clarity around the available land base and the long-term management of the forest resource."
That same year, Canfor closed its Taylor pulp mill, and later closed its Fort St. John sawmill in 2024, blaming high operating costs, U.S. tariffs and lack of reliable, long-term wood supply.
In Fort Nelson, Mayor Fraser says the province needs to not only figure out how much wood supply is left, but to also invest in critical upgrades needed along the rail line between his community and Fort St. John.
What little wood is being cut and salvaged right now is being trucked south at extremely high costs, and rail upgrades would make Fort Nelson's community forest more economical for investors, he said.
He's pushing for those multi-million investments at this week's Union of B.C. Municipalities meetings with the province.
"For us, it's rail, rail, rail, rail," he said. "We can build a forest industry again if we can get this rail up and running."
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