In search of new solutions for forestry

The current crisis in the world economy and especially in the forestry sector should encourage us to question ourselves and our ways of working, to reinvent the forest economy. While important for foresters everywhere, this is doubly so for eastern Canada and the north-eastern USA where forestry has long been - and continues to be - a critical part of regional economies.

Sustainability is central to forestry, but climate change, invasive species, regional extinctions and complex ecosystems all present new challenges for ensuring sustainable management. Some actors promote expanding and intensifying forest practices, while others question development and suggest reducing the human footprint. Public demands upon forests are increasingly diversified, and the last two years have seen a debate about future directions in New Brunswick and a new Forestry Act in Quebec. Forest scientists are being asked to help society and practitioners better understand complexity, and deal with change and uncertainty.

Responding to these challenges will require more than superficial changes in forestry. Ecosystem-based management, innovative silviculture, product diversification, forest certification and chain of custody, and carbon trading are all among the current initiatives of the forest sector to adapt to a new context. However, many of these ideas are rooted within our traditional view of forests and the forest economy. Will they be sufficient to enable us to rebuild our sector or will they be inadequate in the face of more fundamental issues ?

Reinventing ourselves and the forest sector means questioning our approach to forestry, along with the courage to adopt innovative and unproven ideas. What will be the place of large-scale transformation industries that currently dominate forestry? Is there a role and place for new players and products ? Will wood fibre continue to be our primary product? What other models exist for forest management and for forest tenure? How can we promote « value-added » and innovation ? What are the implications for north-eastern USA and eastern Canada? What are the niches that we can occupy more effectively and efficiently than others ?

These are but a few of the questions that need to be raised as part of a forestry that is more varied and more complex. ECANUSA 2010 invites scientists, practitioners and other forest stakeholders to help us find responses to these questions and to imagine new directions to ensure that forests, forestry and foresters can continue to provide for our society and our region. We should seek not just to survive the current crisis, but to use it as an opportunity to develop a forestry that is stronger, more diverse and, most importantly, more resilient.