Divided landbase, overlapping tenures, and fire risk

Abstract

The Tardis forest modeling program was used to investigate the effects on timber supply and delivered wood cost of alternative forest tenure policies on a forest management agreement area in northeastern Alberta. Under the current tenure policy (business as usual), the woodlands divisions of one large pulp company and several sawmill companies are responsible for different aspects of planning and forest management on the area. We propose an alternative tenure policy (global planning) whereby one forest management entity is responsible for harvesting timber and delivering it to the various mills. The global planning alternative has several advantages over business as usual, especially for the sawmill companies. With business as usual, the sawmill companies experience shortfalls in timber harvest volume. No shortfall is seen with global planning. Under global planning, delivered wood cost for the sawmill companies is reduced by $2.81 m-3, on average. Forest fire is an important disturbance affecting timber supply in the area. We examine the joint effects of tenure policy and fire using Monte Carlo simulation. The superiority of global planning is even more apparent with fire incorporated in the model. According to our simulations, many sawmills are very likely to experience persistent sharp decreases in delivered wood volume under business as usual. No such decreases occur under global planning.