Canada NewsWire
October 3, 2000

VANCOUVER, Oct. 3 /CNW/ - An unusual collection of international experts is meeting in Vancouver on Wednesday, Oct. 4th, to discuss new ideas for trying to sell some very ordinary things.

The gathering includes officials from organizations as diverse as theWorld Bank, the World Resources Institute, First Nations from Vancouver Island, timber companies, environmental groups, research organizations and financial analysts and investors. They'll be discussing strategies for creating markets for things that come from forests that most people take for granted - like fish and animal habitat, water quality, biodiversity, wild flora and fauna, and carbon in the form of huge organic reservoirs - so that the environmental benefits or services provided by functions performed by forests can be conserved.

The October 4/00 event is being convened by Forest Trends, a global organization that is promoting discussion on new approaches to the creation of economic benefits from the full range of values associated with forests. The workshop is also sponsored by the University of British Columbia and the BC Ministries of Forests and Environment.

Weyerhaeuser Company vice president Linda Coady is a Trends director from BC and one of the conference organizers. "What everyone involved with Forest Trends has in common," she says, "is that we're all interested in forests. Where we diverge is that we're interested in those forests for different reasons."

Weyerhaeuser, of course, is interested in growing trees that can be manufactured into building materials and paper products. Randy Hayes, another Trends Director and president of the California-based Rainforest Action Network, is more interested in protecting trees for their ecological values.

Most people agree, says Michael Jenkins, executive director of Forest Trends, that forests contain a lot of different values and perform a number of different and important functions - purifying water and cleaning pollutants from the air, for instance. "But our economic system tends to take a narrow view of forests," he says. "It tends to stress the importance of things that people will pay money for."

Jenkins believes that circumstance is at the root of much of the conflict over forest resources, both in BC and elsewhere in the world. "The reality is that the new forest economy is going to be based on both timber and non-timber values. Finding mechanisms that will enable some of the non-monetized values associated with forest conservation to compete on a more equal footing with timber would help defuse some of the polarization that can accompany debate over forest issues."

Both Jenkins and Coady acknowledge it all sounds pretty far out but insist that the unique timber and non-timber values associated with coastal forests make British Columbia the place to watch globally for innovation and breakthroughs on these issues.

So how will British Columbians know when the new forest economy is working? "Forest companies usually organize themselves and their subsidiaries around products and profit centres", says Coady. "So when you see a forest company teaming up with an environmental group, a local community, an aboriginal group or an ecotourism operator to form a company with a website that contains the words "biodiversity.com" - you'll know the new forest economy has arrived."

Not likely to happen? The people from Forest Trends believe it could be coming soon to a forest near you.

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For further information: Abbie Milavsky, (604) 240-6088; Sarah Goodman,
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