ADAPTIVE FOREST MANAGEMENT IN QUEBEC: Bits of the big and small pictures
by Nelson Thiffault, Stephen Wyatt, Marc Leblanc, and Jean-Pierre Jetté

“Always in motion is the future.” Yoda was right. And that’s why people invented adaptive management.
In its simplest expression, adaptive management is often described as “learning by doing”. At the other end of the spectrum, academics emphasize the need for adaptive forest management to “incorporate knowledge from multiple sources, make use of multiple system models, and support new forms of cooperation among stakeholders”. In between, we find operational definitions that revolve around a systematic process that ensures a continuous improvement of management policies and practices, based on learning from outcomes of operational programs.

Forestry is becoming more complex with increasing social demands requiring ever more detailed planning and management. As described by Bell and Baker in a previous issue of Canadian Silviculture, adaptive management is a response to this complexity. It involves setting goals and objectives, evaluating, implementing, and monitoring options as well as performing appropriate adjustments based upon the results. Adaptive management is not just trial and error nor is it just the usual reviewing and adjusting cycle used by most managers. Instead, adaptive management is similar to a scientific experiment for testing different policies or processes for managing forests. Managers need to decide what they hope to achieve and how this can be done. They should be able to put forward hypotheses and identify observable results or measurements that will indicate success. Critically, a monitoring process is needed to look for these results as well as to identify any unintended effects before major problems arise. Perhaps most importantly, information must be circulated back to managers so that policies and processes can be adjusted as necessary. This set of activities takes place at various levels, from the management of a given forest unit to the provincial forestry regime itself, and so we believe it is useful to distinguish between big picture and small picture adaptive management. The big picture is when forestry regimes are adjusted in response to new issues. By contrast, the small picture is found at the management plan level, where tangible actions are taken to evaluate various options in a process aimed at modifying goals and forest management prescriptions.

Therefore, our objectives are two-fold. First, we aim to briefly describe selected reforms the Quebec forestry regime has gone through over the past 20 years. This will help highlight the extent to which adaptive management takes place at the policy and legislative level. Second, we will look at adaptive management in smaller scale applications, describing initiatives where this approach is used to deal with the uncertainty of outcomes. Although incomplete and far from perfect, we believe this two-level assessment provides interesting insights into the way adaptive management is currently implemented in Quebec.

Big Picture Adaptive Management
For over a century and a half, until the mid-1980s, the Quebec government granted forest concessions to private industry over large territories. Concessionaires held extensive rights and responsibilities for forests within their concessions. As early as the 1950s, people questioned the long-term viability of this approach for wood supply as well as the social impacts on rural communities. In the early 1970s, a strong popular movement emerged seeking to cultivate the public forest as a way to survive and occupy the territory. 
These factors, along with others, led the government to revoke forest concessions. This was a fundamental change that was initiated in 1974 and culminated in a new forestry law in 1986. This reform was colossal, eliminating forest concessions along with all the rights and privileges that came with them. From thereon, legislation controlled all activities that could affect the productivity of the public forests. In short, private industry signed contracts with the government to supply a certain volume of wood on a specific area. In exchange, companies would have to produce management plans and respect new regulations. Notably, the government officially integrated the principle of sustainable forest management in its forest policy.

Following public hearings conducted in the early 1990s, the Quebec government adopted the Forest Protection Strategy in 1994. This strategy essentially aimed at gradually reducing pesticide use in public forests, while maintaining a sustained wood supply and favouring harmonious uses of all forest resources. It was comprised of preventive silvicultural measures and identification of needs for new knowledge as well as legislative and management adjustments. A systematic follow-up of the results obtained was planned and carried out. Among other results, the strategy has led to a complete ban on chemical pesticides in public forests. 

Commencing in 1996, the government undertook a review of its forestry regime. A number of changes were proposed, but events were overtaken by public controversy over forests and sparked an independent enquiry into forest management, commonly known as the Coulombe Commission. The commission held public hearings in numerous towns and communities across the province and tabled a report in late 2004. Among the major shifts proposed were the adoption of an ecosystem-based approach for forest management, decentralizing forest management, and establishing a new post of Chief Forester.

This brief review illustrates that the Quebec forest regime has gone through major modifications in its history, particularly in recent years. Can we consider this evolution as adaptive? Adaptive management requires the deliberate use of policies designed to enhance the rate of improvement in a proactive manner. Many reforms were mostly reactive in nature, driven by economic, social, and technical factors, and especially by public opinion - a process common to most forestry regimes. However, there are also emerging elements representative of an adaptive approach: setting policy goals, planned and systematic review processes, incorporating the most recent scientific information into management, and adjusting policy, legislation, and practices accordingly. As a result of this evolution, Quebec’s forestry regime now recognizes sustainable forest management, embracing criteria such as biological diversity and social responsibility, ideas that were not a priority 40 years ago. 

Small Picture Adaptive Management
Implementing Ecosystem-based Management
One recommendation of the Coulombe Commission was that ecosystem-based management become central to forest management in Quebec, a principle now included in legislation. Ecosystem-based management is a way to conserve biodiversity and ecosystem viability while responding to socio-economic needs and respecting social values associated with forestlands. It implies stakeholder participation in decision-making, and is based on the identification of critical ecological, social, and economic issues. Ecosystem-based management requires an adaptive approach; it implies embracing the unknown as an integral part of management.

The Laurentian Wildlife Reserve was selected as one of three pilot regions to test ecosystem-based management at an operational scale. The Reserve covers 8,000 km2 between the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean and Quebec City regions, dedicated to wildlife conservation and development (Figure 1). The pre-industrial forest, dominated by old-growth, irregular fir stands, has been altered by interactions between natural disturbances and more than 50 years of various forest practices. 

Respecting the co-management principle underlying the ecosystem-based approach, project partners are involved at the very top of the management structure. The Partner Table, responsible for preparing the management plan, includes representatives of interested governmental agencies, forest industry, native communities, recreational associations, and ecological groups. A scientific committee, which includes scientists recognized for their expertise in fields such as silviculture and ecology, ensures that decisions and actions integrate the relevant scientific knowledge. Partners consider scientific information along with socio-economic considerations to progressively build the ecosystem-based management plan.

Although decisions are made using the best available data, it is a practical reality that many decisions have to be made with less information than managers would like to have. It is here that the process will adopt an interactive, non-sequential approach. Action decisions will have to be made, but they need to be accompanied by requests for additional information coupled with a commitment to monitor effects and to review the decisions within a specified timeframe. For example, a decision on maintaining certain old-growth forests may be accompanied by biodiversity research and by the monitoring of effects on all management objectives. As monitoring and research provide new information on specific ecological targets, the partners will be able to review their earlier decisions.

An Adaptive Approach to the Protection of Forest Soils
In line with its commitment to sustainable forest management, the Quebec government initiated a process to attain specific soil conservation objectives. Compaction, rutting, loss of productive areas and surface erosion have been identified as the most important physical soil perturbations induced by forest activities (Figure 2). Specific, easily measurable indicators were set in place and included in the current management process. As these indicators are periodically monitored, and compiled into databases, it is possible to perform local, regional, and provincial assessments of the situation for specific soil conservation objectives. Focussing on results in protecting and conserving forest soils rather than on means, this adaptive approach enables professional foresters to develop solutions appropriate to specific contexts. This approach is complementary to the usual regulation, and is a privileged tool to ensure continuous practice improvement and facilitate accountability processes. 

Looking back, looking forward
Adaptive management is establishing itself at various levels in forestry. Looking at the big picture, the evolution of the forestry regime in response to new issues includes re-assessment mechanisms to evaluate the effectiveness of policy and practice. An increase in monitoring and information-sharing processes under adaptive management will help to attain such objectives. At a smaller scale, implementation of ecosystem-based management demonstrates how an adaptive management framework can help stakeholders incorporate new information and collaborate in decision-making. Managing with environmental indicators, such as those used for forest soils in Quebec, is an example of how adaptive management can be implemented as part of usual forest practices. We hope that such initiatives will contribute to expanding the place for adaptive management as forest management in Quebec and across Canada becomes increasingly complex.

Yoda: “ Impossible to see the future is.”
Luke: “Well, let’s be adaptive.”

Dr. N. Thiffault is a research scientist at the Quebec Ministry of Natural Resources and Wildlife. He is currently chair of a scientific committee advising on biodiversity issues related to ecosystem-based management in Quebec. He can be reached at nelson.thiffault@mrnf.gouv.qc.ca. Dr. S. Wyatt, formerly General Manager of the Conseil de la Recherche Forestière du Quebec, is Professor in Forest Policy at the University of Moncton at Edmundston, New Brunswick. M. Leblanc and J.P. Jetté are ecosystem management specialists at the Quebec Ministry of Natural Resources and Wildlife.