
October 7, 2016 · 0 Comments
Doug Skeates wrote wisely about trees, which can help reverse the growth of deserts and are the best and cheapest way to sequester carbon.
Since 1996, when I bought a small farm to grow trees, the Ontario government has adopted a “stick” approach to private forestry, demanding a bureaucratic “managed forest plan” every 10 years if a farmer grows trees instead of field crops or livestock. The plan must be audited at farmer expense to ensure that the claimant is actually growing trees, while the benefit is merely the same property tax rate as all other kinds of agriculture.
The late Andrew Dixon planted trees throughout his lifetime and recorded the growth results and selling prices. He showed in his treatise “Tree Farming” (available from Guelph University) that trees can yield a greater income per acre-year than some farm crops. The catch, of course, is that the planting generation cannot reap the proceeds, only the labour and cost.
Eighty-five percent of Ontario forest is publicly owned, mostly north of the French River, while 97% of southern Ontario forest is privately owned. It would greatly encourage tree planting on abandoned or worked-out land if the Ontario government were to adopt the “carrot” technique: eliminate the “managed forest” paper work and attendant government bureaucracy, and take the same approach as for other kinds of farming. Forestry is, after all, just farming.
Charles Hooker
East Garafraxa