A second video of the Alberta Forest Products Association’s #Foresters campaign has been released!
This video campaign was created to help inform the public about the specialized knowledge that professional foresters have and the importance of sustainability in all that they do. If you missed the first video, released last week, be sure to take a look.
In this week’s video, we hear from Spray Lake Sawmills field forester Kalina Velez about the importance of sustainable forest management, which includes careful planning, harvesting, and regrowth.
Kalina makes a very interesting comparison between foresters and farmers, pointing to the similar process of growth, harvest, and regrowth. Instead of cultivating the same landbase continually, foresters create short-term disturbances based on long-term planning. As Kalina explains in the video, “we harvest, we plant, we leave.” After planting, companies are required by law to monitor the trees for 14 years to ensure adequate regrowth.
While long-term plans help protect our forest resource, there are also many regulations in place to ensure that proper management occurs. All registered professional foresters and forest technologists must attend an approved forestry program; Kalina attended the forestry program at Lakehead University. Along with the training received at school, there are laws and policies put in place by the government that must be followed. Forest management professionals must also abide by a strict code of ethics. These regulations are audited carefully. If policies, laws, or the code of ethics are broken, a forester can lose the ability to work in Alberta.
There are still four more videos to come! Be sure to follow the Alberta Forest Products Association on Facebook and Twitter to catch the rest of the campaign and learn more about Alberta’s forest industry.