Ending the War in the Woods: What Canada’s Forest Battles Can Tell Us About Resolving Conflict

Wednesday, March 21, 2012 4:10:00 PM - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 6:00:00 PM
Rm. 1210, Bahen Centre, 40 St. George Street
Douglas Pimlott Memorial Lecture



TIMOTHY GRAY, Program Director, Ivey Foundation

ABSTRACT: Canada’s forests have boiled with social, political and economic conflict since the 1980s. Road blockades, legal disputes and marketplace action sought to change society’s view of the value of forests. Now almost 30 years later a coast-to-coast truce has been called by the forest industry and the environmentalists while the lead protagonists explore whether respecting each other’s interests and values can lead to a future where more forest is protected and the industry can return to profitability. Tim’s talk will explore the history, actors and power wielded in forest conflicts and examine how it lead to the negotiation of the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement, the world’s largest conservation accord. He will also reflect on why it took almost 30 years to get to this point and how lessons from the forest can be applied to other critical economic and ecological issues facing Canadians

BRIEF BIO: Tim is the Program Director at the Ivey Foundation. Tim’s professional focus has been in the areas of conservation design and land-use planning, forest policy and practices. He has specialized in project development and management, negotiation, market development and government relations. Tim has been a member of several Ministerial Advisory Committees including the Ontario government’s Old Growth Forest Policy Advisory Committee, the Forest Accord Advisory Board and the Ministers Council on Forest Sector Competitiveness. He co-led the ENGO intervener group in the Ontario Timber Class Environmental Assessment and the Partnership for Public Lands ENGO collaboration during Ontario’s Lands for Life land-use planning process. He also has taken roles related to the development and use of market mechanisms to achieve conservation change and been involved in the development of FSC Canadian regional standards and of procurement policies in Central America. Tim was a founding Board member of Global Forest Watch Canada and his current commitments include membership on the Ontario Provincial Forest Policy Committee and the Boards of Directors of the Socially and Environmentally Responsible Aggregate, Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, the Wildlife Conservation Society Canada, and the Steering Committee of the Canadian Boreal Forest Agreement. Tim worked as an executive director and senior program manager with the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society from 1990 until 2005. Tim joined the Ivey Foundation as Program Director in November 2005. Tim obtained an undergraduate degree in Biology from Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ontario in 1987 and a M.Sc. in Botany/Environmental Studies from the University of Toronto in 1992.