The B.C. government has tasked new Forest Minister Ravi Parmar with reviewing its lead timber agency, B.C. Timber Sales.

The Jan. 15 news release announcing the review, and Premier David Eby's mandate letter to Parmar, both downplay the environment in favour of the business side of forestry.

BC Timber Sales is an independent organization within the Ministry of Forests, Lands, Natural Resource Operations and Rural Development, created to develop Crown timber for auction. BCTS plans and designs logging operations, builds logging roads, then sells the timber to the highest bidder.

"I've heard loud and clear that people want change now," Parmar said in an interview with the Nelson Star.

"The structures that we have had in place decades ago don't fulfill the obligations and the social licence and the responsibilities that we have today."

One of those BCTS obligations is timber volume, which Parmar said the review will look at ways of increasing.

Parmar said he also wants the review to improve relationships with communities.

"For those communities that that have frustrations and challenges, and with an organization like BC Timber Sales, I think this is an opportunity for us to be able to create stronger working relationships, to be very transparent in terms of our dealings within communities."

The ministry said the review would focus on the following six goals:

• create forestry-sector growth, competition and diversification;
• provide predictable and reliable market access to fibre;
• diversify access to fibre for the manufacturing sector, including value-added facilities;
• strengthen partnerships with First Nations and communities;
• provide more jobs for contractors, workers and communities; and
• lead in innovative, sustainable forest management and silviculture practices.

There is no mention of watersheds, biodiversity, wildlife, and climate change in either the news release announcing the review or in the mandate letter, which mentions old growth once in passing.

The ministry has not said what the timeline is for the review's completion.

Parmar was first elected as the MLA for Langford-Juan de Fuca in a by-election in 2023 and re-elected as the MLA for Langford-Highlands in 2024. In November 2024, he was appointed Minister of Forests and also serves as Deputy Government House Leader.

Old growth and conservation

One of the recommendations in B.C.'s report on old growth forests entitled A New Future for Old Forests, written by foresters Al Gorley and Gary Merkel in 2020, is that the government "declare that conservation of ecosystem health and biodiversity of British Columbia’s forests as an overarching priority and enact legislation that legally establishes this priority for all sectors."

The report described this as a "paradigm shift" from "manage for timber" to "manage for ecosystem health," and the government declared this to be official policy at the time.

Asked why this priority is not mentioned in the above six reasons for the BCTS review, or in Eby's mandate letter, Parmar said, "I'm fully committed to fulfilling my obligations on the old growth action plan. ... Biodiversity, taking care of our lands, being good stewards of our land, is critical to me, and it's going to be a huge part of this review."

The review will be carried out by a task force consisting of Lennard Joe, chief executive officer of the BC First Nations Forestry Council; George Abbott, former B.C. cabinet minister; and Brian Frenkel, councillor, District of Vanderhoof, and former president of the Union of BC Municipalities.

Parmar said he has three goals: "One is restoring confidence in the sector, the second is standing up for workers, and the third is honouring the commitments we made to the Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples."

One of the persistent public criticisms of BCTS from environmental advocates is a potential conflict of interest between economics and ecology. The same BCTS officials responsible for developing and advertising cut blocks are also responsible for the approving cutting and road permits – the fox guarding the henhouse.

Parmar did not seem to be aware of this issue.

"This hasn't come up in my conversations, but I would say that everything is up for review," he said.

As for climate change and its effects on forests including drought, wildfires and flooding â€” another topic that does not appear to be a focus of the BCTS review or of his mandate letter — Parmar said, "All of those things are on the table. British Columbians only have to look to California to see what our neighbours down south are going through.

"I think BCTS has been doing a lot of good work, but I think there is an opportunity for them to do even better work, and that's why I'm hopeful that British Columbians will join us, and there will be mechanisms through our provincial forest reform, for the entire sector to come together to have these conversations."

A common criticism of the province's approach to forest health is that it is difficult for the public to understand what part of a forest is classified as old growth and what part is not, what has been deferred from logging and what has not, all because of a that can be changed at the discretion of a forest company or BCTS manager.

Parmar did not indicate that he was familiar with this problem but stated that it is the sort of thing that the province's new Forest Landscape Plans will solve.

This is a series of localized community processes that will include all sectors to create forest plans for a defined area. The resulting plans would encompass values associated with conservation, healthy ecosystems, communities, First Nations, and the timber industry.

The province is in the early stages of implementing these planning tables across the province. Landscape plans are underway as pilot projects in Quesnel, Nimkish Valley, Burns Lake, Sunshine Coast, and Bulkley-Morice. There are none in southeastern B.C.

The advancement of the landscape planning tables and the review of BCTS are two of eight items listed as Parmar's job in his mandate letter from the premier.

Other tasks in the mandate letter include creating jobs by encouraging value-added industry with diverse products for international markets, ensuring "efficient delivery of permits required by industry while maintaining our world-leading environmental standards," a harvest yield of "45,000,000 cubic metres per year while fulfilling our commitment to protect old growth," expanding the community forest program especially for First Nations, and creating jobs by fighting for a good deal in softwood lumber and tariff negotiations.