How do we get from this…to this?
Learn how selective logging can reduce the risk of wildfire around your home, earn income from the logs, and supply the materials to construct a carport, woodshed or other buildings.

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As head of the B.C. Transmission Corporation, David Emerson will be a key architect of the city’s (and the province’s) economic future
By John Cathro and Paul Webster

For David Emerson, the past year has been a wild ride. At the Beijing Olympics in 2008, he was Canada’s top representative. Back in Ottawa, he was the country’s minister of foreign affairs (and B.C.’s top Tory). Then, in September of last year, Prime Minister Stephen Harper called a snap election and the one man who could claim to be a close confidant of both Harper and B.C. premier Gordon Campbell was out of a job… Read the full article at Vancouver Magazine.

First Nations Claim Their Land – Canada’s Olympic Countdown
a report by Jürgen Hansen, Simone Stripp and Paul Webster with additional research by John Cathro
Broadcasted on DEUTSCHE WELLE International German TV on Feb. 8, 2009

When the 2010 Olympic Games put Vancouver firmly on the world sports stage, the spotlight will also be on the region’s First Nations, or Aboriginal Peoples. They are gaining increasing influence, particularly in western Canada. Their claims to ownership of key swathes of land have now been recognized by Canada’s highest courts and by the provincial government of British Columbia. With the court rulings to back them up, a few hundred native Americans can block projects worth billions of dollars, including the long overdue modernization of high-tension power lines that supply Vancouver with electricity.

Is “smart regulation” dumb for Canada’s wilderness areas?
by Paul Webster and John Cathro

It started like a nasty marital spat flaring up in a crowded hotel lobby. It turned into a long series of angrier spats heard around the world. The antagonists were loggers and environmentalists, quarrelling over an Ireland-sized chunk of British Columbia labelled the Great Bear Rainforest… Read the full article as a pdf

Published in BC Journal of Ecosystems and Management
by John Cathro, Susan Mulkey, and Tom Bradley

This extension note provides a spatial description of the distribution of small, area-based tenures in the province of British Columbia. It summarizes important socio-economic and biophysical data, including the locations of small tenures. The unique management implications … Read the full article as a pdf

A pine beetle infestation is ravaging B.C. forests. Evidence points to climate change as the catalyst.
By John Cathro and Paul Webster

As boom towns go, Quesnel, a quiet community of 11,000 in central British Columbia, can lean on it’s history. It first made its mark during the Cariboo gold rush back in 1862. After the gold thinned out, the lumber industry moved in. Now, Quesnel has another boom on its hands…Read the full article as a pdf

Setting the bar for well-managed forests
by John Cathro

For years in BC, the land-use debate has been about protected areas – where not to log. Passionate, sometimes violent struggles have been waged among First Nations, environmental activists and communities on the one side and the forest industry on the other side… Read the full article as a pdf

by John Cathro and Sheri Walsh

“The forest tenure system is outdated, having been overtaken by new economic and social conditions.” With these words, Peter Pearse, PhD, RPF, head of the last Royal Commission on Forestry in the 1970s, set the tone for a recent forest tenure workshop… Read the full article as a pdf

Developing tenure that benefits communities
by John Cathro and Sheri Walsh

A brief history of tenure reform in British Columbia. Tenure reform in British Columbia has been ongoing since the first Timber Licences were granted by the provincial government in 1888. During the last century four Royal Commissions of Inquiry sought to redefine the ways…Read the full article as a pdf

This short clip demonstrates how highly combustible forest fuels near communities can be disposed of by burning. Filmed in West Creston, BC, Canada, these workers all live in town and neighbouring communities. This project is part of a regional effort lead by various levels of governments to reduce the risk of fire in the interface between the forest and people’s homes.