The Interior Logging Association is back in the Kamloops area with its 65th annual general meeting and convention from Thursday, May 4, to Saturday, May 6, at the Tk’emlúps Powwow Grounds and other venues in Kamloops.
“We are very excited to be able to have the complete event this year” said ILA general manager Todd Chamberlain.
“We are really looking forward to seeing our ILA members, suppliers, vendors and all the new equipment at this year’s show. I also want to express our gratitude to not only all our exhibitors, but to all our co-sponsors for their continued support of our show, our members their communities and our industry.”
The ILA has once again partnered with the BC Forest Safety Council to present the Interior Safety Conference from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Thursday at the Coast Kamloops Hotel and Conference Centre, at 1250 Rogers Way in Aberdeen. Tickets to the event are free and will feature former Kamloops Blazer and Vancouver Canuck Corey Hirsch as one of the keynote speakers. Go online to bcforestsafe. org for more information.
This year, Forests Minister Bruce Ralston will
be in attendance at the ILA luncheon, which will take place on Friday at 11:30 a.m. at the Coast Kamloops Hotel and Conference Centre. It is a limited seating engagement.
“We are very honoured that Minister Ralston is taking time out of his very busy schedule to be our guest speaker at the luncheon this year,” Chamberlain said. “It’s not an opportunity we have often and we anticipate tickets will sell out”.
Other events include the Thursday night meet and greet, the Friday breakfast and the popular Friday night dinner and dance featuring the Shawn Lightfoot Band.
There will also be a live chainsaw carving and a log loader competition, sponsored by Brandt Tractor, at the powwow grounds on Friday and Saturday. In addition, a silent auction throughout the event will send partial proceeds to the Ty Pozzobon Foundation. For more information on all the events, go online to interiorlogging.org.
The forestry sector has seen increasing challenges over the last few years, especially with rising fuel prices, escalating equipment costs, old growth deferrals, apportionment decisions and falling markets.
Despite those challenges, Chamberlain said the ILA has been working even
harder to support their members.
Office administrator Nancy Hesketh has had the heavy task of managing not only the day-today operations, but is also working with business support consultant Meagan Preston due to the need for more support to help members pivot and grow their business with funding proposals, grants, work opportunities and partnerships.
The ILA is continuing its work with the Nicola Valley Institute of Technology and the BC Forest Safety Council to help in the development and delivery of the Forest Worker Essentials Program.
The program, utilizing funding obtained with the technology institute, will provide a six-week program to attract new workers to the sector by exposing them to all areas of the industry using a safety-minded hands-on approach.
The end result will see new workers who can begin to fill the more than 20,000 vacant industry positions anticipated in the next 10 years.
While he is no stranger to the difficulties in the industry, Chamberlain said he is optimistic that with the ILA offering individual support, forging new partnerships, engaging with existing workers and businesses and the attraction of new ones, the venerable organization can continue to help move the industry in a positive direction.
Afamily-owned and operated business, Top Down Enterprises Inc., was founded in 2016, with the goal of supporting HSM Forestry Machines in the establishment and implementation of safe steep slope harvesting practices.
Located in Tk’emlúps, in the Mount Paul Industrial Park, Top Down Enterprises primarily serves the Thompson-Okanagan region, B.C. and Alberta.
The company recently expanded its business to become the Western Canada dealer for sales of the TimberMAX Traction-Winch Systems and Nisula Forest Harvesting Heads and Shears.
“We branched out with our heavy equipment repair as a core part of our business and then added products to support the business, as well,” co-owner
Roseanna Niedziejko said.
The smaller-scale harvester heads and shear heads work to mitigate environmental impacts with the intention to promote improved forest land management and to reduce wildfire risk and forest health.
“It’s definitely a direction the industry is heading,” Niedziejko said. “It’s an area we thought
would be beneficial, to bring products in to support.”
Niedziejko said the equipment can be used by both small and large contractors in the industry to manage the forest.
“By using smaller equipment, it reduces your environmental footprint,” she said.
“You can have a more cyclical harvesting time period if you do
more selective thinning. We like to call it forest gardening. You take out some of the overgrowth and unhealthy stuff so that the rest of the material can thrive. You get better harvested material in the end.”
Dealership trained with more than 20 years of experience, Top Down Enterprises coowner Mike Niedziejko has a vast knowledge base and a strong technical and mechanical ability when it comes to heavy duty construction equipment repair and servicing as he has worked for most of the major dealerships.
Roseanna Niedziejko takes care of accounts receivable and invoicing inquiries, with an extensive background of experience through financial institutions, accounting, service writing and administrative services.
Top Down Enterprises will have a Nisula 555H Harvester
Head on display at this week’s Interior Logging Association Convention at the Tk’emlúps Powwow Grounds.
The company will also be promoting the TimberMAX Traction-Winch system, which provides an innovative solution that increases safety while working in steep-slope environments by providing traction-assist to equipment.
“We really want to provide that full spectrum service and to get back to building relationships with people,” Niedziejko said.
“We really want to understand where our customer’s needs are and determine whether the products will facilitate those.”
For more information on Top Down Enterprises, visit the company’s website at topdownent.ca.
In April of 1958, 16 men, all connected to the logging industry, met in Rutland and formed the Okanagan Logging Association as a body independent of any others in the province.
Several Okanagan-area loggers and truckers joined. Harold Hildred was elected president and the initial membership fee was $10.
The objectives of the association were to promote the interests of those engaged in logging, to protect members against unfair practices, to reform abuses in the industry, to seek freedom from unlawful extractions and to provide accurate information to its members.
The mandate spoke to the difficult circumstances that loggers faced at those times, circumstances that have not changed that much in the ensuing 60 years.
By 1960, however, member-
ship grew from outside of the Okanagan area and, to reflect the growing area of representation, the name was changed to the current Interior Logging Association.
In the first few years of existence, the association was focused primarily on trucking issues
related to weight restrictions and licensing that were so unfair to loggers that they could no longer sit and do nothing about it.
One of its members, Cecil Philpot, elected to spend two weeks in a Kamloops jail rather than pay an overload fine. This act
of defiance galvanized the fight for ILA members and membership grew.
Through the early 1960s, the ILA pushed hard against the Department of Commercial Transport on road weight restrictions that were causing undue
hardship for many ILA members. The politics of the situation became clear, however, when overload restrictions were imposed on Interior roads when the government cited logging trucks as the cause of highway damage.
However, as noted by ILA publicity director Harold Hildred, “now that there is an election here, trucks don’t damage roads anymore.”
In 1962, the ILA approached the Department of Commercial Transport, but this time regarding truck licensing fees.
In a brief presented by president Peter Dyck, the ILA noted the quarterly system of truck licensing caused problems for many logging truck operators, given their seasons of work. The dispute was eventually settled, with changes made to the licensing scheme.
By 1972, the ILA had more than 1,000 delegates at its 13th annual convention, where the delegates were warned by then-resources minister Ray Williston that multiple use of B.C’.s forests being promoted by the growing environmental movement was the new mantra and that loggers, like all forest users, had to accept that things were changing.
The ILA embraced the need for change and president Audrey Baird noted “multiple use was the way to go.”
In 1977, the BC Logging Association was created via the merger of the ILA and the Central Interior Logging Association, with Derrick Stammer as chairman of the joint board of directors.
With growing memberships in both organizations and issues that were common to both, it was felt joining forces and pooling resources would give a stronger voice to Interior con-
tractors and truckers in policy and regulatory development.
While the merger initially provided benefits to the joint memberships, by 1982 local issues forced separation of the two organizations and the ILA once again continued working on behalf of its Southern Interior membership.
Following ongoing pressure brought to the government by the ILA — hand-in-hand with its counterparts in other areas of the province — regarding ongoing abuse of contractors, Bill 13 was introduced by then-forests minister Claude Richmond of Kamloops.
Forestry is British Columbia’s founding industry and logging is its lifeblood The Interior Logging Association knows the importance of timber harvesting to BC’s economy and has been a strong and unifying voice for its members since 1958.
Our association’s strong and influential voice in the forest industry represents independent loggers’ interests throughout this region.
We work to keep the timber harvesting industry thriving, promoting the benefits of a robust and sustainable industry, raising awareness and educating our youth about the importance of forestry and ensuring our members continue to be a strong economic force in the province.
Through our solid alliance with other forest sector organizations, the ILA has contributed to the growth and cultivation of a healthy, sustainable and vibrant forest resource in British Columbia that will support our communities, families and economy today and always
The ILA works with First Nations, Provincial, Federal & Municipal Governments, WorkSafeBC and BC Forest Safety Council to ensure our members’ interests and safety are recognized in policy and regulations that impact our industry, our businesses and the communities we live and work in
u Group Benefits: Health, Dental, Accident u Resources, Training, Scholarships & more
Todd Chamberlain, RFT General Manager todd@interiorlogging.org
Nancy Hesketh, Office Administrator nancy@interiorlogging.org
250.503.2199
3204 - 39th Ave. Vernon, BC V1T 3C8
If you are
As stated by Richmond upon introduction of the bill, its purpose was to address logging contractors’ security in British Columbia. With input from the ILA, the act was updated in 1992 to clarify amount of work provisions and in 1996 it was again updated to become the legislation that endured until 2003.
Wayne Lintott was hired as the ILA general manager in 1998 and Nancy Hesketh joined as office administrator in June of 1999.
With a background in forest harvesting equipment sales and a keen understanding of logging and trucking, Lintott led development of the ILA for decades and has been succeeded by Todd Chamberlain (whose message about this year’s event can be read on page C3).
Also in 1998, the ILA purchased its current office in Vernon in order to secure its longerterm financial stability. With land and building values always on the rise, ownership of its office made economic sense.
The fall of 2007 saw Pope and Talbot, one of the province’s major forest-products operators, file for creditor protection in the wake of growing financial losses.
As part of the eventual bankruptcy settlement, Interfor purchased its two southern B.C. Interior sawmills in Grand Forks and Castlegar,
along with other various company assets. However, not all logging contractors received payment for their services and the logs that they had collectively delivered to Pope and Talbot mills in inventory.
In aggregate, more than $4.3 million was owing and each contractor was to be listed as an unsecured creditor and likely to only recover cents on the dollar.
The ILA stepped in and worked with then-forests minister Pat Bell and the courtappointed receiver to facilitate 98.2 per cent of payments of all money owed to contractors.
The lessons learned from the Pope and Talbot bankruptcy and the fight to recover money owed to contractors was a pivotal motivation for government to heed to the 10-year advocacy effort by the ILA and other provincial logging associations for the creation of the Forestry Service Providers Protection Act. For 60 years, the ILA has worked to promote the interests of those engaged in the logging industry in the Cariboo and Southern Interior regions of the province and to promote and support forest education and awareness.
Many rural communities depend on the forest industry for their livelihoods’ where ILA members live and work.
Our sincere gratitude to Kamloops and our Co-Sponsors for making this event possible
• Acera Insurance Services
• BC Forest Safety Council
• Canadian Forest Products
• Dawson International Truck
• Finning (Canada)
• First Truck Centre
• Gorman Bros. /Canoe Forest Products / Downie Timber
• Great West Equipment
• Inland Group
• Johnstone’s Benefits
• Kamloops Tirecraft
• Kruger Inc
• Logging & Sawmilling Journal
• Mercer Forestry
anada stretches across five time zones and numerous climate regions.
The Arctic Circle is covered in permafrost, yet Point Pelee in southern Ontario is farther south than northern California. The soil and water and conditions that sustain the nation’s forests vary greatly across such geographic expanse.
As a result, Canada features 12 forest regions and sub-regions, each supporting characteristic tree species and forest types.
BOREAL (PREDOMINANTLY FOREST)
The largest forested area in Canada, this region forms a continuous belt from Newfoundland and Labrador west to the Rocky Mountains and north to Alaska.
The boreal forest is mostly coniferous, but includes a mix of deciduous trees, such as white
birch and trembling aspen.
BOREAL (FOREST AND BARREN)
A sub-region north of the boreal forest region with a colder climate and shorter growing season nurturing predominately spruce and larch (tamarack).
Along the northern edge, the forest thins into open lichenwoodland, then treeless tundra.
BOREAL (FOREST AND GRASS)
A sub-region south of the main boreal forest region where a warmer climate nurtures this deciduous forest, where trembling aspen and willow flourish along the edge of the prairie.
SUBALPINE
A coniferous forest stretching from the mountainous uplands of Alberta, across the Rocky Mountain range, through the Interior of British Columbia and
west to the Pacific Coast. The sub-alpine and boreal regions both feature species including black spruce, white spruce and trembling aspen.
MONTANE
Covers most of the Interior uplands of British Columbia, part of the Kootenay Valley and a small area east of the Rocky Mountains.
It is a northern extension of the typical forest of much of the western mountain system of the United States and extensive prairie communities of bunch grasses and herbs are found in many of the river valleys.
COAST
A unique area along the Pacific Coast of British Columbia that is almost exclusively coniferous.
COLUMBIAN
Encompasses a large part of the Kootenay Valley, the upper Thompson and Fraser river valleys and the Quesnel Lake area of British Columbia.
This coniferous region merges with coast, montane and sub-alpine forest regions.
DECIDUOUS (CAROLINIAN)
It is widespread across the eastern United States and extending into southwestern Ontario between Huron, Erie and Ontario lakes.
Some southern deciduous trees have their northern limits in this region, including tulip tree, cucumber tree, pawpaw, red mulberry, Kentucky coffee tree, sassafras, black oak and pin oak.
Conifers are few, but there is a scattered distribution of eastern white pine, Tamarack, eastern red cedar and eastern hemlock.
GREAT LAKES/ST. LAWRENCE
It extends inland from the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River to southeastern Manitoba, but does not include
the area north of Lake Superior.
This region is mixed coniferousdeciduous, which, in addition to the principal tree species, includes wide ranges of eastern white cedar and largetooth aspen
ACADIAN
It stretches across most of the Maritime provinces.
The region is closely related to the Great Lakes–St. Lawrence region and, to some extent, the boreal region.
GRASSLANDS
Though not a forest region, the prairies of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta support several species of trees in great numbers.
Trembling aspen form groves or bluffs around wet depressions and continuous dense stands along the northern boundary.
TUNDRA
A treeless area between the polar icecap and the treeline of the Arctic region, its permanently frozen subsoil (permafrost) and a short growing season supports only small, hardy vegetation.
The columbian forest (above) can be found in the Kootenay Valley, the upper Thompson and Fraser river valleys and the Quesnel Lake area of B.C., while the boreal forest can be found in a continuous belt from Newfoundland and Labrador to the Rocky Mountains.
for log loading.
Forestry is a major employer in B.C., yet few people outside of the sector understand the differences between the various job titles and designations.
The Association of BC Forest Professionals registers and regulates the province’s forest professionals — registered professional foresters, registered forest technologists, special permit and limited license holders, accredited timber cruisers and accredited timber evaluators. These professionals have
post-secondary education, or equivalent, in forestry, in addition to many years of experience and are responsible for managing the forests. They may look after all aspects of the forest, including forest health (insect infestations, diseases and fire), fish and wildlife habitat, preparing areas for harvesting and much more.
In general, forest professionals ensure forests are managed sustainably.
• Forester usually refers to
a registered professional forester (RPF). Foresters have university degrees, or equivalent, specializing in forestry and have spent at least two years articling before passing a rigorous registration exam.
• Tech or technologist usually refers to a registered forest technologist (RFT). RFTs have a twoyear college diploma, or equivalent, in forestry and have spent at least two years articling before passing a rigorous registration exam.
• Accredited timber cruiser (ATC) is a specialist who is trained to accurately figure out how much and the quality of each tree species is available for harvesting. A cruiser has on-the-job training and must demonstrate competency before being allowed to use the title ATC. Note that RPFs and (more commonly) RFTs may also be ATCs.
• Accredited timber evaluator (ATE) is a specialist similar to an
ATC; however, the timber evaluator has more experience and is able to supervise a team of cruisers. Like ATCs, ATEs must demonstrate their competency before being allowed to use the ATE designation. Note that RPFs and (more commonly) RFTs may also be ATEs.
• Silvicultural accredited surveyor (SAS) measures the quantity and quality of young forest stands, usually planted after harvesting, and provides recommendations to ensure these stands reach maturity. Like ATCs and ATEs, they must demonstrate their competency before being allowed to use the SAS designation. Note that RPFs and (more commonly) RFTs may also be SASs.
• Forest professional is a generic phrase that refers to any of the above five job categories.
Other forest workers:
• Logger usually refers to a
number of workers whose job it is to harvest timber and bring it to a mill. The term “lumberjack” is similar to logger, but is not used in B.C. It is an eastern North American term.
• Fallers are specialists who may have voluntarily become certified for the dangerous position. They are specifically trained to hand fall trees and are highly skilled.
• Forest technician usually refers to someone with some postsecondary education, such as a certificate. Forest technicians perform important data collection work in the forest.
• Forest worker usually refers to non-professionals who work in the forest, such as loggers, fallers and technicians.
• Machine operator refers to a forest worker who operates various types of machinery during forest harvesting operations.
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