Nature vs. Industry at Queen's Park
Asad Kiyani

The largest environmental protest of the year took place at Queen's Park on Saturday.

Seven hundred and fifty protesters from across the province demonstrated against Lands for Life, the government's plan to reallocate the use of 46 million hectares of land in central and northern Ontario. Forty million hectares of this land are publicly owned.

Lands for Life (L4L) was started in February 1997 by the Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) as a way of replacing land-usage guidelines originally created in the 1970's and 80's. The MNR is trying to determine which areas should be used for industry and which areas should be used for tourism or designated as protected areas. According to the World Conservation Union, protected areas are places where "industrial activities are excluded, especially logging, mining, hydroelectric, and oil and gas development."

To create a plan, the area in question was divided into three areas - the Boreal West, Boreal East, and Great Lakes/St. Lawrence regions. A 14-member Round Table, was established in each region to make recommendations to the MNR. The process was to be completed by February 1999.

Complications ensue

The procedure is not without controversy. The guidelines being replaced took 10 years to create, while L4L is to be completed in two years. The speed of the process is attributed to modern technology that enables researchers to predict faster the impacts of different land usage methods. However, the improved speed of planning does not allow for the relatively slow speed of public discussion.

From the beginning of the initiative, the Ministry said that only "stakeholders" (industries and people resident in the planning area) would be consulted, leaving 85 percent of the province's population without a say in the fate of 40 million hectares of public land.

The Partnership for Public Lands (PPL), made up of World Wildlife Canada, the Federation of Ontario Naturalists and the Wildlands League, has done it's own research into L4L. Their recommendation is that 15-20 percent of the planning area should be protected. According to their website, "This is the minimum needed to maintain Ontario's ecological and economic health." Currently, only 5.9 percent of the forests are protected.

Tim Gray, a director of the Wildlands League, says that the MNR has refused to "incorporate the PPL's science." The government is merely concerned with having an example of every species of plant and animal rather than a "functional" ecological system, said Gray.

"We tried to take into account natural processes while the government used a checklist approach," said Gray.

Economics

The Toronto Star described the situation as "Lands for Life or logs for jobs - it's industry versus the environment in battles over Crown land-use."

However, it is inaccurate to describe the disagreement as a fight for jobs. From 1966 to 1994, 55 percent of Ontario's logging jobs were lost. Between 1989 and 1994, employment in the local industry declined 24% while the amount harvested increased by 15%. The same technological advances that have sped up the L4L planning process have drastically curbed industry employment while increasing industry profit.

Also, the MNR itself has said that the forestry industry will face the same timber supply it has now in the year 2040, with or without an expanded system of protected areas.

Any temporary employment increases generated by industrial activity would at least be partially offset by losses in the tourism industry. Also, there is a large economic benefit to communities that host provincial parks. In the 1996/97 fiscal year, the parks and their visitors spent 1.5 billion dollars.

Other concerns have been raised. The MNR has considered leases that are over 90 years in length, as opposed to the previous standard of 20 years. For its part, the forestry industry is now seeking "perpetual leases." In essence, they are asking that public lands now be permanently granted to private corporations. In addition, there have been quiet discussions of allowing logging and mining in existing provincial parks.

Opposition

The controversy led up to this weekend's protest, at which 750 protesters portaged 160 canoes through downtown Toronto to the Ontario Legislative Assembly.

At the demonstration, PPL co-ordinator Ric Symmes attacked the government's stance, describing the Round Table recommendations as "a big industry sell-out dominated by the forestry and mining industries [who want to] get access to virtually everything."

"The government needs to think of it as an opportunity, not a problem," said Symmes. "We are offering the North a better deal [than the MNR currently is]. There's a lot of inertia and history and fear. There's a lot of [unwarranted] fear out there about losing jobs."

The final recommendations were to be made public on October 22, but were postponed until October 30. According to sources on the Round Table panels, the government will present a plan that greatly favours the concerns of local industries. These recommendations will have only one percent of protected area, instead of PPL's recommended 15-20 percent.