Funding from Forest Enhancement Society of BC

[Scooter]

From today's WFCA "Rumour Mill Roundup" newsletter:

Just after noon today in Prince George Premier Christie Clark announced $150-million in additional funding to the Forest Enhancement Society of BC (FESBC) “to plant tens of millions more trees, which will help fight climate change and create over 3,000 jobs in rural British Columbia.”

This would bring total funding to date to the FESBC to $235-million taking into account the original funding it received when it was created about a year ago by our government. It would also make the arm’s-length-from-government society a major component in delivering on two of the BC Liberals’ principal strategies: job creation and climate change. Given that the society is just approaching its second year it shows our government has considerable confidence in the organization and its business model for delivering on what are likely going to prove to be very complex goals and objectives.

In our modest view some of that confidence may be justified. By giving the funding to the FESBC the money becomes exempt to some of the rules around government fiscal budgets and immune to the shifting priorities and claw backs that forestry funding has occasionally suffered from in the past. It also sets up the possibility of attracting federal funding being the FESBC’s mandate is separate, at least in theory, from government’s own obligations around maintaining a diverse and abundant forest resource.

Offsetting this optimism a little, we have to invoke the truism, “The devil remains in the details.” And there are a lot of them. Nevertheless, this has to be seen as good news for the forestry contracting sector.

A complete text of the press release is attached.

[TripleS]

Good news, although a commitment to sustained funding would be better.