Forestry and the Forest Industry in the Central Interior of British Columbia

The forests of BC’s central interior range from dry, lodgepole pine dominated forests, to high-elevation cold, wet spruce and sub-alpine fir forests. The forests pro-vide a multitude of resources and support a range of activities including guide-outfitting, trapping, recre-ation, and timber harvesting. Forest management in the central interior of British Columbia began with the promise of a railway passing through Prince George, and increased dramatically during the world wars and with the establishment of pulp mills in the region. Forestry in the central interior has undergone many changes in legislation and management practices which are summarized for the Prince George, Mackenzie, and Quesnel Timber Supply areas. This paper shows how Crown forest lands are partitioned for resource utiliza-tion and discusses the determination and allocation of the allowable annual cut in these areas. Forest land clas-sification and management practices are summarized, and current influences on the landscape, such as the mountain pine beetle, are discussed