The Committee met at 7:00 p.m. in the Legislative Chamber of the Colonial Building.

MR. CHAIRMAN (Langdon): Order, please!

Before we have a presentation by the Minister of Forestry and Agriculture, I would like to have a motion that the Minutes be adopted as read, with corrections, noting the omission of the name of Vice-Chair, Mr. Woodford.

On motion, minutes adopted as corrected.

MR. CHAIRMAN: We would like to welcome the minister and his officials from the Department of Forestry and Agriculture. For the members, with the minister and his staff, I will introduce the people from the House of Assembly: Mr. Alvin Hewlett, Green Bay; Mr. Alec Snow, Menihek; the Vice-Chair is Mr. Rick Woodford, Humber Valley; Mr. Tom Murphy, St. John's South; Mr. Danny Dumaresque, Eagle River, and Mr. Harold Small, Baie Verte - White Bay. Before the minister has his presentation, for the benefit of the members here I'd ask if he would introduce his officials to us. Also, be reminded, when the minister or his officials speak, identify yourself for the record. Mr. Minister.

MR. FLIGHT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is only for recording, we're not amplified here, are we?

MR. CHAIRMAN: No, no.

MR. FLIGHT: Okay. First off, Mr. Chairman, I would like to do as you suggested, introduce my staff. On my immediate right is Mr. Robert Peters, Deputy Minister of the department. To my far right is Mr. Martin Howlett, ADM for the agriculture side of the department; on my immediate left is Dr. Mohammed Nazir, the Assistant Deputy Minister of Forestry, and on the left of Dr. Nazir is Mr. Leonard Clarke, the Director of Financial Operations. On my far left, next to Mr. Clarke, is Ms. Margaret Power, the Director of Human Resources for the department.

Mr. Chairman, I'd just to like to try to set the tone from the outset to tell you that I am here, I'm sure, and my officials are here, for one reason and one reason only - to provide as much information as we possibly can on the spending estimates of the department. That is what the focus will be and, hopefully, we will be able to answer any questions asked. In the event something is asked that is so technical that none of the people at the table can answer, I'll provide the answer tomorrow or at the first possible chance.

I just want to say that the reason we're here - we were kept outdoors for ten minutes - is that I requested the Colonial Building for nostalgic and historical reasons. The Vice-Chairman of the Committee and I, myself, have some great memories of meetings held here years ago. That is why we're here, as opposed to the Confederation Building.

Mr. Chairman, I don't know for sure what the format is. The department is divided into two branches, Forestry and Agriculture. Forestry was always, as you know, a line department, and Agriculture came with Forestry and is a large part now, if not 50 per cent of the department. I have a few opening remarks here ready that were prepared by my staff. One deals with Forestry and the other with Agriculture, so where shall we begin?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Go ahead and give the opening statement.

MR. FLIGHT: Go ahead and deal with Forestry, or -

MR. CHAIRMAN: Give the both of them and then -

MR. FLIGHT: Pardon me?

MR. CHAIRMAN: I said, give both statements and then we'll go from there.

MR. FLIGHT: Okay. I am going to read these. They are fairly brief. I think they are about probably five, six, or seven minutes, something like that.

Mr. Chairman, before the members of this Committee get into the debate on the Budget Estimates of my department, I would like to take this opportunity to outline, in general terms, the forestry and agricultural functions of my department and describe some of the programs my department carries out with the funding provided in these Budget Estimates.

I would like to deal with forestry first. Forestry, as you know, deals with management, utilization and the protection of the forest resource of this Province. Forests, of course, are a natural, renewable resource. They are renewable only if you manage them well. Wanton destruction without any regard to their renewal does not guarantee any benefits to our future generations. It is therefore necessary that forest resources are managed in such a way that they not only serve the needs of the current generations of people but they also protect the interests of future generations. Despite the fact that we are currently spending $13 million per year on silviculture relating to improving the forests and its productivity, through thinnings, reforestation and other techniques, Newfoundland is relatively a newcomer in investing in the productivity of this resource.

The history of large-scale silviculture does not go beyond the past fifteen years. Even when we thought we had reached a plateau of sophistication in managing our resource, we have discovered we had merely begun our task. Forests are not a collection of trees providing wood for industry, lumber and firewood, forests are living ecological systems which support all kinds of plants, animals and various life support systems for the human race, including the water we drink, the air we breathe and the space in which we live.

Mr. Chairman, recognizing the complex ecological nature of our forests, government has agreed to manage the forests on its sustainable development basis, which requires management of the resource as the ecosystem. The basic forest management technique maintains a modern forest inventory, nurseries to produce seedlings for planting, credible reforestation programs, silviculture thinnings, management of the forest, fire management, both fire protection and the use of fire for preparing sites, efficient utilization of this resource for industrial and non-industrial uses.

The integrity of the water sheds, the soils, wildlife habitat, etc. are well-known and will be used in managing this resource, but above all, efforts will be directed at creating a climate for management of this resource, in such a way that various multiple values and uses of this resource are balanced for the maximum benefit, both current and future, of our people. We are putting in place a system of sound ecological management of the forests with input from the public, various user groups and various government and non-government organizations who are interested in proper management of this important, natural resource of our Province.

Mr. Chairman, I have outlined our overall philosophy in managing the forest resource and our desire to balance all values and uses flowing from the resource. At the same time, however, we cannot ignore the fact that we have benefited by deriving a livelihood for many of our people from the forest industry and we will continue to do so. The Province's three pulp and paper mills, hundreds of saw mills, and numerous firewood production operations generate much needed jobs and incomes. Without this source of income in our rural communities, Newfoundland would not be what it is today. Towns like Grand Falls-Windsor, Badger, Millertown, Bishop's Falls, Corner Brook and Deer Lake would not have come into being without these forest industries. The prosperity of these towns continues to depend on a viable forestry resource. Unfortunately, the current economic recession during the past year or so, and the turmoil in the world markets have created very unstable conditions in the forest industry, especially in the pulp and paper sector. Unless the prices improve or the Canadian dollar falls significantly, this export-oriented industry will continue to face difficulties.

On the domestic front, efficiency in the mills, lower cost, high quality products are going to be of paramount importance. There have been job reductions in the mills and in the woodlands; these cutbacks are hard to take, but necessary to maintain the viability of the industry. I hope our industry will come out of the current difficulties successfully. Despite the hard times, Mr. Chairman, the forest industry and the two levels of government have been able to maintain, and in fact, expand to some extent the silviculture program.

We are again carrying out jointly-funded silviculture programs on pulp and paper industry-held lands, with $3 million being expended on Abitibi limits and $3 million on Corner Brook Pulp and Paper lands; also, $4 million will be invested on Crown-held forest lands. In addition, $2 million to $3 million will be invested through a silviculture worker training program. Other sources of funding will also be explored. For example, last year, we were able to invest approximately $1.5 million in various forestry activities through the provincial job creation program. The silviculture program will result in the planting of over eight million trees in the Province and thinning and improving almost 7,000 hectares of forest, along with other activities such as reclaiming the high-graded forest by clearing the sites for reforestation.

Mr. Chairman, there are always complaints by the saw-millers about the lack of adequate sawlogs supply in the Province. We have been attempting to improve that supply by acquiring wood from the pulp and paper companies and providing access to various forest sites. We had noted, however, that despite the complaints by the saw-millers about adequate sawlogs supply, there were a lot of sawlogs being shipped by saw-millers and others as pulpwood. My department has taken a very strict stand against conversion of sawlogs into pulpwood and we will be enforcing this very strictly. We will be continuing to work with the NLPA, the Newfoundland Lumber Producers Association in providing the sawlogs supply and transfer of technology to our sawmills.

My department has provided $62,000 to the NLPA during 1992, by way of a grant. We are also working on various research and development projects directed at improving the outturn of wood from existing forest stands through better utilization of the trees. Some specific projects include: trials of a timber royalty system based on standing volume that provides incentives for users to maximize timber utilization; development of computer-assisted on-site analysis of sawmills to help owners identify opportunities to improve efficiency and logging systems evaluation to determine their environmental and forest management impacts. To further improve the availability of wood to the industry, my department will be constructing approximately fifty kilometres of forest access roads in 1992-93.

In addition, a small technology enhancement fund has been established through the federal/provincial co-operation agreement for forestry development which provides support to projects directed at improving utilization or processing efficiency through the introduction of new technology. Specific projects include testing of a slash chipper, testing of systems to extract timber from commercial thinnings, comparative evaluation of two mechanical harvesting systems and the development of a prototype small scale chipper, canter and sawmill. All of these investments in the resource must be protected from fire and insects and we will continue to provide adequate protection against fires through staff located throughout the Province and by a fleet of eight water bombers.

With regard to insects, the hemlock looper infestation this year is minimal. A few pockets still persist but they are at locations which are isolated and are in forest stands which may not be utilized during the current rotation. It will, therefore, not be advisable to protect these isolated forest stands. The eastern spruce budworm, on the other hand, after remaining at very low levels of population, is beginning to show some surge. Its population is forecasted to increase this year and is close to our highly valuable silviculture treatments. We have therefore included a small insect protection program using the biological insecticide Bt in our 1992 operations.

Mr. Chairman, I regret that probably took a little longer than I thought. I have a very short statement on agriculture.

MR. CHAIRMAN: We have time to do that.

MR. FLIGHT: Mr. Chairman, the agriculture industry is experiencing many challenges at the provincial, national, and international level and this has drastically increased activities in many policy areas. One major issue facing the industry today is that of the GATT negotiation and its potential effect on supply management.

Mr. Chairman, I want to emphasize the commitment of this government to the supply management commodities and the beneficial effects they have for our Province as a whole. The government recognizes the benefits of the Province and the country producing its own food where possible, and we intend to support this. The Province is not directly involved with the negotiations of the GATT but we have made our position clear to the federal government. Every possible effort has been made to ensure that Canada's objectives are met. This government agrees with the principle of supply management and the stability it brings to producers, retailers and consumers alike.

Another issue we are dealing with at present is the continuing pressures on the productive land base, especially around the Avalon Peninsula. The food source has to be protected, if not, we will become more dependent on imported products with continued price increases and job losses in agriculture. To help ensure this protection, we have allocated funding again this year to the land consolidation program.

Mr. Chairman, farm cash receipts have fortunately shown an increase from 1990 to 1991 of $2 million, from $59.4 million to $61.4 million. The majority of this comes from the livestock sector, $48.8 million, with crops contributing $10.1 million. We remain a net importer of wood products but are self-sufficient in food, milk, and nationally export some of our eggs under a surplus removal program. The Province's export commodities are blueberries, furs and partridgeberries.

Mr. Chairman, and members of the Committee, the senior review committee set up to review the report of the Agri-Foods task force is actively evaluating the recommendations contained in this report. The committee has spent a great deal of time and effort on the triple issue of hogs, chicken and the Newfoundland Farm Products Corporation. This is a very complex issue and one that will require some hard decisions. The committee has completed its work in this area and has moved on to other parts of the report.

Mr. Chairman, the school milk program, of which I am personally very proud, I say to the vice-president of the committee, was started by the Newfoundland and Labrador School Milk Foundation during the past year and this government was please to provide financial support to this effort. The success of the program speaks for itself. The school coverage and the milk consumption have far exceeded the original forecast. This program benefits the dairy industry but the major benefit is better nutrition for our school children, so, for fiscal 1992-1993, this government will contribute funding of $150,000 to this very worthwhile initiative.

Mr. Chairman, and members of the Committee, government has concluded several new federal/provincial programs over the past year in support of the agriculture sector. I would mention the financial support to the fur industry and the Net Income Stabilization program, better known as NISA. In addition, there is a $1 million cost-shared Environmental Sustainability Initiative program which is continuing to be funded from fiscal year 1992-1993. Also, the Atlantic Livestock Feed Initiative program has been extended and funded in this budget. The present Agri-Food Development Subsidiary agreement expires March 31, 1993, and the extension to the ALFI expires in September of 1992. To advance planning in this area in preparation for a new comprehensive cost-shared development agreement, a committee of both levels of government and industry are developing a financial package for discussion to develop the many opportunities which the agriculture sector offers.

The fur producers of this industry have always done well in terms of quality of products when compared to their counterparts in the rest of the country or, for that matter, in the rest of the world. However, producers are dependent on silver fox and mink. If the fur industry is to survive in the long-term, it must diversify its lines of furs so producers can survive the market downturns in one or two years. The department believes there is a real opportunity to start this process of diversification by carrying out research and demonstrations of various other species.

We are very pleased that under the Canada-Newfoundland Comprehensive Labrador Subsidiary agreement, an experimental research and demonstration facility for lynx and pine marten has been established through a local rancher in the Lake Melville area. The objectives of this project are to examine economic feasibility, feeding regimes, management practices, and serve as a demonstration facility and a future potential source of breeding stock.

Mr. Chairman, that concludes what I call my opening statement. Whatever your format is now we will follow. I am prepared to answer or to have my officials answer any questions arising out of the Estimates.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much, Mr. Minister. What we have been doing in the other Committees is to have the Vice-Chair for fifteen minutes to respond, and after that the members of the Committee, ten minutes, asking you and your officials questions pertaining to the Budget. Mr. Woodford.

MR. WOODFORD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will just touch on a couple of the headings first and then get into some other questions of the minister and his officials.

Under Executive and Support Services - 1.3.02, Information and Statistics, what were the Professional Services there in .05? What happened there? Nothing was budgeted, yet it was revised to $7,500, and then, an expenditure of $185,000.

MR. FLIGHT: That $185,000, Mr. Vice-Chair - under the Canada-Newfoundland Forestry Agreement, there are allowances made to evaluate the program twice during the life of the five-year agreement. That $185,000 will be used to monitor and evaluate what has been accomplished at the midpoint of the agreement.

As you know, it is a $65 million, five-year agreement. One of the conditions of the agreement was that the program, and what had been accomplished, would be evaluated midway through the agreement and at the end. The $185,000 is for that purpose.

MR. WOODFORD: Under Professional Services, what would be involved in the evaluation? What would you be using there, to evaluate a program that's federally-and-provincially-driven?

MR. FLIGHT: The way that money will be spent, Mr. Vice-Chair, is that there will be contracts called from consulting companies to evaluate what's been done and what's been accomplished under the agreement up to this point in time. That report will be made available to the federal government and, of course, to the Province. There will be purchased services in the sense that there will be contracts let, or tenders called, for the evaluation of the program.

MR. WOODFORD: Well then, 1.3.02.06, under Purchased Services, last year they budgeted $139,000 and revised at $21,000, and now this year it is down to $42,500. Would that be a crossover between the two? How come they budgeted $140,000 and spent $21,000?

MR. CHAIRMAN: You may go ahead - just state your name.

DR. NAZIR: Purchased Services are meant to purchase materials, pay for reports and buy equipment and various products in support of the program. Again, since this is mostly cost-shared, we may budget, but it does not necessarily mean that we will spend it too, because there is a management committee with federal and provincial officials on it. All the projects are submitted to the management committee and if they are approved, we will spend the money, if they are not approved there may be savings and we may be able to transfer money from one area to another.

For example, you find $7,500 revised, spent in Professional Services, although there was no budget. So we have the flexibility that if the management committee agrees to one part but does not agree to another, we can move the money around.

MR. FLIGHT: Specifically, Mr. Vice-Chair, .06 - Purchased Services - the printing and developing of brochures relating to the agreement activities and the development and production of education materials and to promote the objectives of the agreement, so, specifically, that .06 is for the printing and development of brochures relating to the agreement activities and to promote the objectives of the agreement.

MR. WOODFORD: So, under Professional Services, the $185,000, you said, was twice in the life of the five-year agreement?

MR. FLIGHT: Midway, and when it started.

MR. WOODFORD: To evaluate the agreement, how it is administered, what good it has done?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, what has been accomplished by the agreement?

MR. WOODFORD: The total agreement.

MR. FLIGHT: The agreement specifies how we can spend the money - on silviculture or not on silviculture, on wood deal or not on wood deal, and I guess, the feds feel they should monitor and determine whether we have spent the money as per the agreement, and basically, that is the purpose.

MR. WOODFORD: You announced that new mill down in Roddickton where the company - I think it is Norwegian, is it, or Fin? -

MR. FLIGHT: Pardon me?

MR. WOODFORD: Is that a Norwegian company?

MR. FLIGHT: No, Austrian.

MR. WOODFORD: - is going to ship out the lumber from Canada Bay; take over the Canada Bay lumber plant. Will they finish that product there, will it be sawn, planed and kiln-dried or just sawed and planed?

MR. FLIGHT: In Roddickton, sawn, planed and kiln-dried.

MR. WOODFORD: They will kiln-dry it right there before they ship it?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: The total product?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: So they will have to put up a -

MR. FLIGHT: A kiln dryer.

MR. WOODFORD: They will have to put up a completely new building, a new kiln?

MR. FLIGHT: A new kiln, yes; that is part of their plan. As a matter of fact, they can't ship wood from Eastern Canada into Europe unless it is kiln-dried.

MR. WOODFORD: Unless it is kiln-dried, that is what I was going to say.

MR. FLIGHT: (Inaudible) aware of that.

MR. WOODFORD: You mentioned sawlogs, that you were going to get tougher with regard to a lot of sawlogs going into pulpwood. That has been going on for years, but I have always found it is hard to control because you have no way to police it. Unless you have some on Crown lots or something like that, it is very hard to police. How do you propose to police that now or are you talking about, primarily, places like Chouse Brook or White River or places where they have an agreement between the companies and the government?

MR. FLIGHT: Obviously, we are hoping for co-operation, in the first instance, I can tell the hon. member, but we are going to use our own enforcement staff. We have also talked to the paper companies, because they are, obviously, the point of entry. I have asked them to co-operate, and they will know whether or not the sawlogs - obviously the odd sawlog is going to slip through, or the odd twenty logs maybe, but it has been going on to the extent of people chucking in prime sawlog material for pulp. We are going to ask the company to co-operate, and we visualize the possibility of asking our inspectors to arrive at the mill yard some day and spend a day or two. The saw-millers will know about it - they will not know when they are going to be there but, I mean, we can only police it, as you know, with the number of people we have, and they are very limited. But we have had already - and I don't like to brag about prosecutions - but we have had situations where that has happened, and would have been turned back and that kind of thing, and we are going to escalate that. We are going to get the message out. I spoke to the NLPA at the last annual meeting, where loggers and saw-millers from all over Newfoundland were gathered. We have their support. We are going to renew our own resources and look for the help of the companies in any way they can co-operate to keep sawlogs from being turned into pulpwood.

MR. WOODFORD: You have had cases where wood has been turned back from the mill yard?

MR. FLIGHT: No, not turned back from the mill yard but intercepted on the way to the mill yard by our enforcement people.

MR. WOODFORD: How is it working out with regard to Chouse Brook where it is 60/40, something like that? How is that working out?

MR. FLIGHT: It doesn't matter, I suppose, if it is 60/40.

MR. WOODFORD: Well, it could be 70/30.

MR. FLIGHT: The average sawlog production is around, I think, 30 per cent for a given stand.

DR. NAZIR: Even less, in some cases.

MR. FLIGHT: Even less than 30 per cent. We issue these permits on the basis that they are sawlogs, but we demand, I guess, 100 per cent utilization, so the onus is on the sawmiller to separate his sawlogs and ship his pulp to the paper mills. We don't expect him to ship sawlogs to the paper mills.

MR. WOODFORD: Let's move on to 2.l.03, Management Planning. I think it is probably the same as in the agreement, but 2.1.03.05 -is that also in the federal/provincial agreement?

MR. FLIGHT: What is that again?

MR. WOODFORD: 2.1.03.05.

MR. FLIGHT: Professional Services.

DR. NAZIR: Well, we have a computer model in Corner Brook which we used when producing our geographic information system. We are modifying that and improving it and there will be some student help plus some consulting work so that model is being modified and upgraded.

MR. WOODFORD: It is in Corner Brook, you say?

DR. NAZIR: In Corner Brook.

MR. WOODFORD: In the office there?

DR. NAZIR: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: So that would, I suppose, indicate why the salary is up, as well?

MR. FLIGHT: That money will also include the funding of a graduate student at UNB to deal with and to adapt the form and timber supply model.

MR. WOODFORD: For forestry?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: How many students will be hired there?

MR. FLIGHT: Students hired where?

MR. WOODFORD: I though Dr. Nazir said there might be some students involved.

MR. FLIGHT: I suggested one graduate student.

MR. WOODFORD: Just one?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, one graduate student of UNB.

MR. WOODFORD: I will leave that for now, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Anybody on this side here? Mr. Murphy, Mr. Snow or Mr. Small?

Mr. Hewlett.

MR. HEWLETT: Mr. Chairman, I am not feeling well this evening. I will have a few comments but if my colleague for Kilbride wishes to savage all and sundry in due course he can fill in for me.

I read a couple of items related to the forestry department that just recently came across my desk. They are sort of associated with my district. A letter just came in the mail today addressed to the hon. minister from the mayor of Triton, by a Mr. Roberts, basically saying, you know, that this is a small, and I presume company, that operates on Crown limits, by the looks of it, or whatever. I am not sure exactly where they operate but they normally employ about fourteen loggers and the allocation of wood this year will provide work for these people for eight weeks only, so they are wondering whether or not an extra two weeks work can be found. I know this is very recent correspondence. It is dated May 8, but I was wondering if I could have some possible reaction? Stanley Roberts & Sons is the name of the company that employs these loggers.

MR. FLIGHT: I say to the member that I haven't seen that letter but I am aware of the situation in his district, which is one of the worse ones, as he knows. In that kind of letter we take each case on its merits, and one of the difficulties in the department that I have had to deal with as minister for three years is, most of our sawmill operators need more wood, and they can market more wood. The problem is that the resource can't stand it. So you almost become known as 'Dr. No,' because you keep saying no to increased permits. I would like to say yes, but there have been specific cases like that which will be looked at on its own merits. If the annual allowable cut in the area can stand an increase that would permit the extra two weeks, then I'd want to do it.

MR. HEWLETT: The reasoning given in the letter is simply, number one, they need the work, obviously, to qualify for UI. But they say there is mature timber in the area that will essentially blow down anyway. So if they don't cut it Mother Nature will. So why not let us? Even though, I suppose, from a technical point of view, it would exceed the number of cords allowable in a given region. I just bring that letter to your attention and I'll be writing you on it.

There was one other item related to my district which I sent your way very recently. It was rather unique in that it had to do with a sawmill operation and it struck me, because I'd seen an article in Canadian Geographic about logging in British Columbia in rough terrain using horses to haul logs and whatnot, sort of stepping back in time in one regard, in terms of technology, but stepping ahead in time probably in terms of environmental impact. This particular person wanted the right to cut sawlogs in an area that has been designated domestic, which I presume means firewood and so on and so forth. But upon the firewood stand there would be a certain number of large logs that could be used for making lumber. This individual, as I understood from the letter, wanted permission from your Department to log that land selectively and pick out the sawlogs using a horse and so on and leave the firewood per se for the firewood cutters, anybody who might have a permit to cut firewood.

I'd certainly commend such an initiative to your Department. If a given stand of what we might call scrub spruce or whatever is interspersed with occasional large fir or spruce of lumber quality, and someone can go in there without tearing up the countryside with a timber jack or some sort of mechanical equipment, and selectively saw down sawlogs and haul them to a distribution point using the old-fashioned horse technology, I would suggest that possibly your Department might look seriously at accommodating such a request. It seems to be environmentally benign and a good use of sawlogs which otherwise might end up as firewood.

MR. FLIGHT: To my knowledge, I say to the member, that request hasn't come to my attention, so -

MR. HEWLETT: It was turned down at the local office. It was referred up to me and I've referred it on. It's only been in the last couple of days so obviously the minister has not seen it. But I appreciate what you say about these things being considered on their merits, because being from a forestry area and being born with an axe in my hand, I know that you can go through a given stand of wood, which the paper companies probably wouldn't have much time for, but someone quite often can go in and cut sufficient sawlogs for instance to build a house or to run a small sawmill operation employing two or three people, and so on.

While the general area marked out on the map says domestic firewood cutting I hope that particular application will be considered on its merits, because it seems a shame that if there is good timber that can be utilized selectively and harvested in a relatively benign manner environmentally, that the application be given serious consideration. Because you get more value obviously for the timber that's growing there.

MR. FLIGHT: I will look forward to receiving the correspondence from the member on it. I have to say, what the member is saying makes sense. I will guarantee the member that my officials will have to convince me that it is not the right thing to do because as the Deputy Minister just reminded me - not that I need reminding - we try to achieve the highest value, the highest return, for the tree count. There may be reasons why it can't be but I'd like to hear them.

MR. HEWLETT: The other thing I want to make a comment on at this time, Mr. Chairman, has to do with fur farming. The political party of which I am a part embarked some time ago on policy conferences around the Province and we had one in Springdale. There was a presentation from the local Fur Breeders Association and one of the things that they raised with our party committee in developing party policy per se, was what you mentioned, diversification of the fur product, particularly pine marten and lynx. They were unable to obtain from the wildlife officials or whomever, even two pine martens, a breeding pair, and the same with lynx, in order to do some experimentation. I gather from what you said earlier there is an experimental program underway now in the Lake Melville area doing just that.

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, there is because we did not have the same problem. As you know, the pine marten in Newfoundland is identified as an endangered species, and I can tell you that I am aware of efforts being made by my department working in conjunction with Environment to get a permit to trap lynx, for argument's sake. It is not resolved yet, however we are working on it.

MR. HEWLETT: (Inaudible).

MR. FLIGHT: Pardon me?

MR. HEWLETT: I said there is one out at the Salmonier Nature Park that sleeps most of the day. We have put him to work with a female and hopefully we may have some positive results.

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, as long as the female did not sleep all day too.

MR. HEWLETT: That's it for me right now, Mr. Chairman, thank you.

MR. CHAIRMAN: (Inaudible).

MR. MURPHY: Mr. Minister, recently there has been a fair amount of talk about agricultural land that is under I suppose, a freeze, that needs to be -

MR. R. AYLWARD: (Inaudible).

MR. MURPHY: Well, I can understand the hon. Member for Kilbride getting a little excited about this issue, he is politically hung out on it so perhaps he will give me a chance. If I say something that does not suit the member, fine, we can talk about something else. Anyway, Mr. Minister, you and your staff, in understanding that most of this land of course is contained in the new amalgamated area of St. John's, in the Goulds area primarily, I just thought that having conversation with a large number of constituents in that area who have called me, they cannot seem to get in touch with their own member, but I respond to them quite often, is that they understand that the department obviously is trying to protect what little agricultural land we have on this side of the Province and rightfully so.

We have an awful lot of farmers, dairy farmers primarily I understand, who have overextended themselves with dairy herds and what have you, and who depend very much now on farms that are kind of dormant, planted in hay and what have you. Now I can understand all of the reasons to protect this land, however, having a little bit of knowledge of the Goulds area, I have seen quite a few properties in that particular area that are now under an agricultural freeze. I am very doubtful that you would get anything to grow there. I do not know if you would get a dandelion to grow on some of it and I think the problem is that perhaps we have reached the time to accommodate these people. History has not done much for them and for a lot of reasons that I would not go into now, I would suggest to you sir, I would ask you, and then maybe suggest that a couple of your staff might want to have a look at that particular area and rationalize some of the tremendous amount of pressure that is put on some of these younger folks in there who want to try and build a home for themselves in a section of that particular parcel of land or piece of land.

MR. FLIGHT: I am delighted to get the opportunity to comment and my hon. friend will understand if I come to the defence of the hon. Member for Kilbride in this particular case.

MR. MURPHY: Somebody has to.

MR. FLIGHT: It is this government's position that we are going to protect the land freeze or the zone he refers to. I saw him stand one day in front of what I would have guessed to be mostly his constituents. They were all there to put pressure on government to have the land freeze lifted, the zone changed, or whatever. Actually I think the motivation from some of the main spokesmen was to do away with the zone, but that is not going to happen. I must say he stood there and told them so. However, you are right though and I am sure the Member for Kilbride will agree that for roughly twenty years the freeze has been there. There have been a lot of changes to the zone. The zone was created in 1973 and there have been at least two or three reviews. In each review a lot of land came out and you probably would not recognize the original zone now. As a result of various things happening, changes to the zone, special permission by the minister or by government on a particular piece of land, there are now areas in the Goulds and in Kilbride, and there is no question about it, on Brookfield Road and in the Northeast, where it is pretty hard, certainly for a layman, to defend keeping it in the zone in the better interest of agriculture.

There is a lot of pressure coming on and I have some real concerns for some of the arguments being made by the people, as you just made them yourself. I say to the committee now that one resolution I am going to recommend to government is that we do a complete review of the zone with a view to identifying, particularly identifying, the problems that you raised. I want it to be clear for the record that to review the zone is purely to determine the inequities that might exist or where there is a piece of land frozen that will serve no purpose for agriculture and you might as well let somebody build on it. It is not in any way to indicate that this government is lessening its intention to protect the agricultural land in St. John's and the Northeast.

MR. MURPHY: Mr. Minister, I agree with you and I think we have to be very careful of what we do with land suitable for agricultural purposes. I certainly respect your response and I am glad to hear that you are taking or initiating a review of the particular zone to probably accommodate a fair amount of residential properties that may very well fit in with the agricultural plan of the area.

I want to thank the minister for his frank answer.

MR. DUMARESQUE: Just for my general information and as one who is not that familiar with the forest industry, what is the state of the wood supply in the Province? I am wondering about Labrador and also what the potential Labrador harvest is and what is the Province losing in the sense of not seeing a reasonable harvest? What kind of tree life are we looking at in that tremendous resource in Labrador if in fact something does not happen? What kind of timeframe are we looking at and what are some of the things your department is doing in that way?

MR. FLIGHT: Well, on the Island part if we do not do things right starting now, or I guess starting five years ago or maybe starting when the previous government implemented their various silviculture programs which would have been in the late 70s I guess, now we are asking, or we are demanding and insisting on 100 per cent utilization of the resource and certainly the wood on Crown land. We are talking to the company about the possibility of that being practised on company land. The problem on company land, of course, is finding a mechanism whereby saw logs or timber harvested on company lands are made available to the saw-millers. It is finding the mechanism. Obviously the companies would have to be remunerated for their fibre and possibly by way of dollars as far as costs are concerned.

On Crown lands we are surely going to insist on 100 per cent utilization. If we get 100 per cent utilization, if we harvest what hitherto has been considered uneconomical wood - in the sense that it has been farther removed from the main access roads or the rivers that the companies use to drive the wood - if we stop burning prime pulpwood for firewood, if we continue with the level of silviculture that we are doing now, particularly in thinning, then we won't run into a timber shortage in Newfoundland on the island that would threaten the operation of either one of our mills, or reduce the present level of sawmilling activity.

However, if we don't do that, if we don't have very stringent silviculture, 100 per cent utilization, stop burning prime pulpwood for firewood, then everyone knows, particularly on Abitibi limits, there could be a problem. But if we do the things that we intend to do and if the following governments continue to do what we are doing now then we won't run into that problem.

Now normally I end that off by saying: and if we do, the ace in the hole is Labrador. Because as you know, people up till now have been talking about Labrador as though there was an unlimited wood supply in Labrador. There is not an unlimited wood supply, but there is a major wood supply, a wood supply that could support a paper mill, I suppose, or certainly a pulp mill, and major sawmilling operations. The problem is that previous governments over the years have tried to attract that kind of an operation to Labrador and it hasn't been successful, because of the economics involved. We would like to see the three paper mills on the island, the two companies, have first right of refusal for pulpwood, or for any by-product.

One of the problems with Labrador, as the member will know, and it was not a problem ten years ago, is the native land claim situation and the environmental situation. Within the past two years it has changed the way you approach Labrador totally. The natives are demanding a say in the way the forest is harvested. They're manning major environmental studies that were not required. They're not required on the island, as a matter of fact.

The other problem with Labrador, as the member knows, is that the wood supply in Labrador is mature and over-mature. It's in excess of 100 years old. So the old cliché, 'use it or lose it', means we're starting to get to that point in Labrador. So everybody in this Department, certainly everybody in government, is looking for, and receptive to and trying to identify ways of developing the forests of Labrador.

But we have a new factor now. We did not have it when I became the minister to the extent we have it, and that's with regard to native land claims. The native land claims, certainly that's major in the Lake Melville area, where the largest wood supply is, they've extended their interest to coastal Labrador. If the land claim situation is not that relevant then there is indication that they are prepared to use the Environmental Assessment Act to make sure they accomplish what....

MR. DUMARESQUE: One more little piece of information. I've been saying for some time that the Labrador wood has a greater yield. Is that true?

MR. FLIGHT: Better fibre, by far. The best fibre by far.

MR. DUMARESQUE: Is it like 40 per cent greater yield or something like that?

DR. NAZIR: It's not that much but it is denser.

MR. FLIGHT: It's denser. It's the best known in the world for pulp fibre.

MR. DUMARESQUE: That's the kind of thing I was looking for, so I can go out and do my selling job.

MR. FLIGHT: I'm talking about fibre for pulpwood.

MR. DUMARESQUE: Maybe one more short question on Labrador. I know that the Labrador agreement had some funding there for, I think it was a fire depot and a forestry unit in central Labrador. What's the latest on those things?

MR. FLIGHT: The forest resource centre has been announced of course, as the member would know, for Northwest River. Proposals have been called and the funding is there. It's full speed ahead. I don't know exactly what the status this day is but -

MR. DUMARESQUE: There's a fire depot being looked at for Port Hope Simpson, or something.

MR. FLIGHT: Oh, okay, I'm talking about the resource centre for Goose Bay.

DR. NAZIR: That is still being considered.

MR. DUMARESQUE: Okay.

MR. FLIGHT: The member wants it to be considered very quickly and done.

MR. DUMARESQUE: We'll see how many fish come ashore now, but more than likely we'll need whatever we can get. Thank you very much.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Could you ask a question and then he will be finished and come back to you? Would that be alright, Alec?

MR. A. SNOW: Yes, go ahead.

MR. SMALL: Mr. Chairman, I'd like to ask to be excused because I have something else to attend to. Larry Short will be filling in for me.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay.

MR. SMALL: Thank you.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Okay. Alex.

MR. A. SNOW: Mr. Minister, to follow along the lines of a question Mr. Dumaresque asked concerning the inventory of wood in Labrador. At present my understanding is that there is wood being harvested in central Labrador that was supposedly to be sold in Europe, I understand. It was sold. Some of it was brought down to the island, to Newfoundland, and consumed here by one of the mills. I wonder if you can tell us what the economic analysis done on that was, how it fared?

MR. FLIGHT: Last year we conducted an experiment. We brought a boat load of wood from the Goose Bay area, as you know, to Stephenville. The whole idea was to try to determine whether it was economically feasible to transport wood from Labrador to Stephenville, in particular.

It was still expensive wood, I can tell the member. As a matter of fact I'm having a report prepared. The hon. Member for Kilbride asked to have a report on that particular project and it is being prepared now. It was still expensive compared to the highest prices that the company pays for wood landed at the mill in Newfoundland. I guess it depends on what happens in the market, if the price of paper was to suddenly be very high for eight or ten years and they could afford to pay more for their wood. It was purely an experimental project and there have been some concerns raised that we were going to do it again or bring two more boat loads. There's no basis for that. At this point in time we're not considering bringing any more wood from Labrador under that particular program.

MR. A. SNOW: You mentioned that there was a subsidy involved in this program?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, a subsidy program.

MR. A. SNOW: You say it was expensive. Does that include the subsidy?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. A. SNOW: How much more expensive?

MR. FLIGHT: I'm not sure exactly how much more. I think the wood cost $135 per cord -

DR. NAZIR: Total.

MR. FLIGHT: Total, $135 per cord landed in Stephenville. We paid that and this was agreed to in the first place, that we pay. Abitibi bought the wood from the supplier, Eastern Harvesters in Goose Bay, and we agreed. Because you know, I suppose, you assume or you take for granted, that if Abitibi-Price was going to have an ongoing wood supply they'd probably put in designated docking facilities, handling facilities, to handle the wood and it would keep their costs down. Because that wasn't there we agreed to subsidize the transportation. I think it cost us up to fifteen dollars a cord to pay the transportation costs. That, included with the price the company paid, made the total cost $135 per cord, which is a fair amount higher than they pay for their wood landed at the mill. The most expensive wood on the island landed at the mill.

MR. A. SNOW: How many cords of wood were shipped out?

MR. FLIGHT: About 5,000. One boat load.

MR. A. SNOW: What's that, $75,000 subsidy, is it?

MR. FLIGHT: It cost fifteen dollars a cord and I think it was around $50,000, the total cost.

MR. A. SNOW: Fifty thousand dollars. Your Department has done quite a bit of work attempting to attract somebody to establish a facility there?

MR. FLIGHT: Well, not only my Department and not only this government, but as the hon. member would know, the previous administration spent a lot of time and effort in delegations all over the world, I suppose, to try to attract people, and they were thinking in terms of pulp mills. There were different groups. I remember there was a Houston group, I think. I don't have the details now, but there was certainly a Houston group, and there was another.

AN HON. MEMBER: Scandinavian.

MR. FLIGHT: There was a Scandinavian company or group which expressed interest.

MR. R. AYLWARD: They all love fishing, too.

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. A. SNOW: Were these people out looking for timber or fish?

MR. FLIGHT: No, they were looking to establish a pulp mill. In the end it fell through, as it has in our case, but we are pursuing it and there is still interest being expressed.

The group in Roddickton, which is purely a saw mill, their original interest was Cartwright and Goose Bay and hopefully we will see the day when they will be there but we have to resolve these native land claims issues first before you commit a company to spend $25 million. This group had intended to invest about $25 million in Cartwright with an understanding that they would invest another $25 million or more in Goose Bay when the time came, when Goose Bay was ready, but for the time being that is on hold until we can resolve our land claim situation.

MR. A. SNOW: You mentioned about an inventory of the product or the wood being done in Labrador, how much money is being spent this year on doing this inventory and how much has been done in previous years?

DR. NAZIR: We spent almost $3 million.

MR. FLIGHT: To date?

DR. NAZIR: Yes.

MR. FLIGHT: To date, there has been about $3 million spent on determining an inventory in Labrador.

MR. A. SNOW: On the inventory of where the wood is, in Labrador?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. A. SNOW: How about over towards Western Labrador and in that area?

MR. FLIGHT: No, no. I would say that up until now the most dollar resource I suppose was spent in the Lake Melville area because that is where the major wood supply is, although I know there is wood in Western Labrador as well, but any thought of establishing an industry up to this point in time, has been based on the wood supply available in the Lake Melville area in Southern Labrador, and that is obviously for shipping reasons and everything else you know.

MR. A. SNOW: Surely to goodness, the minister is aware that it is easier to ship from Western Labrador than it is from Southern Labrador?

MR. FLIGHT: It is getting easier.

MR. A. SNOW: It is easier, it is not getting, it is!

MR. FLIGHT: I do not mind asking the hon. member a question. We have a wood supply in Southern Labrador that is capable of producing 400,000 metres per year forever, on an annual allowable cut, is there that kind of a wood supply in Western Labrador?

MR. A. SNOW: That is one of the reasons why I asked the question whether or not the inventory was there; maybe it is, maybe it is not but I mean, one would think that you would be doing an inventory to see if it is there; there are a couple of local saw-millers but I am sure they are not into that type of capacity.

MR. FLIGHT: The use of the available resources you know, to find the money and spend the money to identify the inventory, I would go out on a limb and suggest that as soon as we complete the inventory - it is not completed in the Labrador and Cartwright area - we will undoubtedly look at continuing those efforts in Western Labrador.

The ADM says we do have a satellite imaging project that gives us some idea of the volume of wood in Western Labrador but it is not that exact where we could come within determining an annual allowable cut, but I know where the member is coming from; he is suggesting I guess, that we should start looking at the wood resource in Western Labrador and determine whether or not it can be developed. I understand there is a very successful sawmill operating there -

MR. A. SNOW: Two actually, I think. The third is in the process of being established. In the salary details, in the minister's office, I noticed there is $10,000 -

MR. R. AYLWARD: Salary details, page 101?

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes.

MR. FLIGHT: Page what?

MR. A. SNOW: 101, salary details.

MR. FLIGHT: Okay, the minister's office - go ahead, Alec.

MR. A. SNOW: Overtime in the minister's office, overtime and other earnings, the $10,000. Surely goodness, you don't get paid overtime do you?

MR. FLIGHT: Oh, all the time. Of course not. Is there a spare copy of the salary details?

MR. R. AYLWARD: That is a spare copy.

MR. FLIGHT: Overtime - $8,500?

MR. A. SNOW: No, it is $10,000.

MR. R. AYLWARD: In this one it is, anyway.

MR. A. SNOW: I hope this is the right year - is it?

MR. R. AYLWARD: Wrong year - sorry.

MR. FLIGHT: Wrong department.

MR. A. SNOW: I had the wrong year.

MR. FLIGHT: Come on, Alec!

MR. R. AYLWARD: You had $10,000 last year. How come you reduced it?

MR. FLIGHT: How come I reduced it? I will have to go to my deputy or somebody on that.

AN HON. MEMBER: That's not for the minister, it is for support staff.

MR. FLIGHT: The hon. member would know that is not for the minister. The minister doesn't get overtime. That is for the minister's staff, the secretaries, etc. If overtime is being budgeted under the Minister's Office, then obviously, it is for secretarial staff, surely not for the minister.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Would it have anything to do with a car allowance?

MR. FLIGHT: It is the car allowance. Thank you for providing that information. I know the minister doesn't get overtime.

MR. A. SNOW: It is $10,000.

MR. FLIGHT: No, it is $8,500. Anyway, the answer to the question is that it is the car allowance.

MR. A. SNOW: So there is an increase in it this year, is there?

MR. FLIGHT: There is no increase in the car allowance. I am sure the hon. member has asked the same question in other committees. As I understand it, the car allowance is $8,000, so the $500 must be for other considerations like overtime for staff - secretaries or whatever. Unless members want to pursue that issue there is no question that $8,000 of the $8,500 is for car allowance and the $500, my staff tells me, is for overtime for the minister's secretaries. There are two secretaries, and an executive assistant who doesn't get overtime either, so it must be for my two secretaries. That is $500 for the year in overtime and other earnings.

Was the member going to move that the minister's car allowance be increased?

MR. R. AYLWARD: I will do that when it comes to me.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Is there anybody else? Bob, do you want to ask a question?

MR. R. AYLWARD: Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. I am not a member of your Committee, but I appreciate being here tonight. I am not here to obstruct the minister or cause him any headaches. I am just looking for some legitimate answers, mostly because it is my responsibility as critic in the House of Assembly to scrutinize the department.

Mr. Chairman, I heard on an international newscast, probably a month ago, a forestry report coming from the Scandinavian countries, mostly Norway and Sweden, about 'sustainable use', I guess these being some of the buzz words that are used in forestry now.

MR. FLIGHT: 'Sustainable development' is probably the term.

MR. R. AYLWARD: They are into their second and third growth of trees now and one of the main problems they are finding, especially in third growth, is that the land itself cannot support the volume of wood that it should support. They find, and you would find the same in agricultural activity, I guess, if you were farming the land, unless you put something back, you can't continue to get the yields. They find it a big problem. I do not know if this was an environmental report or a forestry report, probably an environmental one.

They were raising the concern that even though they planned for sustainable yields - we always said that the forestry is a renewable resource - they figured that unless they do something more to build up the land in between cuttings, they are going to have a big problem. I guess we are only sixty or eighty years behind them and have the same problem. Does the minister have his department doing any studies on these, or do you have any information on this type of concern?

MR. FLIGHT: No, I haven't. The department - we do have a research division, as you know, and they may, on their own, be looking at that. What he says makes sense. I understand what he is saying. I suppose, in areas that developed, regenerated naturally, we must be into some areas of Newfoundland where they are into the second cut, and, of course, the trees in Newfoundland on sites that regenerate naturally, we thin. I'm not aware that the companies or anyone else have complained that the second generation didn't come back - we're talking natural regeneration now, or at least, I am for the time being - didn't come back as healthy or as full as the original.

We haven't had a chance, of course. We have only been planting for fifteen years. We haven't had a chance to determine, when this crop of seedlings we're planting now become mature trees and are cut, whether the soil will sustain another growth. We know when agriculture doesn't work, you have to rotate your crop and you have to put something back into the soil, fertilizer, whatever. Maybe that will be true with trees.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Does your staff know if any of the federal research people are doing studies in this?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. FLIGHT: The ADM tells me there's one study under way. The loss of nutrients as a result of the harvesting could be a valid concern.

MR. R. AYLWARD: When I was minister, I watched some of the tree harvesters with Abitibi. I noticed that they were working fairly well, but they would cut the tree, skin it, and then haul out the full tree. I understand that some of the tree harvesters Kruger are using are hauling out the whole works. At least the skinned tree left something there. That's the point I'm trying to make. The tree harvesters Kruger are using now will take the whole works out and skin it out by the side of the road somewhere.

MR. FLIGHT: By the side of the road. So nothing stays in the forest to reseed it.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes. That is creating a long-term problem. The reason I keep talking about long-term is we have a major problem in the fisheries now, and it is because of poor - no planning, actually. We have to consider things to try to avoid that in our forestry, if possible.

MR. FLIGHT: I can tell the hon. member that although the ADM indicated that the feds were doing some research on the first problem he raised - the possibility of the soil losing its nutrients or whatever and not sustaining a second, third or fourth growth - the other problem he raises is a concern of ours. As to the harvesting machines that Corner Brook Pulp and Paper are using, and the fact that they are, indeed, taking everything out, the limbs and any nutrients that are included going out to one spot, we are concerned about it. We are talking to Corner Brook Pulp and Paper about it.

MR. R. AYLWARD: What do they do with it? Do they just stockpile it there?

DR. NAZIR: They are looking at a number of options. One is to spread it back with a bulldozer or something. Another is to let it rot there or burn it so that the site is available for planting. But they are not going to convert all their system to it, only a limited part, the part, like Abitibi's whereby you leave the slash in the woods and bring out only the wood. It is comparable to your conventional logging. That is not that harmful, because after sixty or seventy years of rotation the site builds up.

If you remove everything then the site may deteriorate. So we have put monitoring studies on it and we'll be monitoring the nutrients. As the minister says, it is a concern. So, if it starts deteriorating the sites, then we will have to get on with the companies, modify their approach and try to bring them back to a short wood system, which means leaving the slash in the woods instead of bringing it outside.

MR. R. AYLWARD: What is the economics or the rationale behind taking the slash out? You would think it would be cheaper or more practical to skin it and take out only what you need to use. What is the reasoning behind taking everything?

DR. NAZIR: The economics of the operation, because on the roadside you can have a mechanized slasher through which those trees can go quickly, and the same machine can slash and de-limb and pile. As compared to the slasher in the woods, they are trying to take an individual tree, clean it up and slash, and move to the next one. As compared to that, roadside slasher is a fixed thing. You push the trees and it's a very high-speed thing and cheaper.

MR. R. AYLWARD: So they just cut it and another machine will grab hold of the whole works and take it out, and the other one continues cutting.

MR. FLIGHT: The decision by the company is purely economical; it is the least cost to deliver wood to the roadside, or they think it is.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes, but it doesn't make sense to me to be hauling out all the garbage with it, that it costs less, you know, that is the only reason. I can't imagine how it would be more economical to haul garbage with your product. They know better than I do, I suppose.

MR. FLIGHT: They say it reduces their labour costs, and that is the name of the game. It doesn't make me happy that you lose loggers in the process, but their argument and their rationale is that those machines reduce their labour costs, and that is the technology they want to use.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Well, the one I saw in Norway certainly would reduce labour costs and leave the slash in the woods because it cut it, skinned it, put it on a little trolley behind it and took it out of the woods. One person did it all and when he had his full load he took it out somewhere.

MR. FLIGHT: But they are using those here on the Island, as well.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes, I know, that is the one that sounds to me to be the most economical. I don't know why Kruger would try them unless they are cheaper to buy them, maybe. The minister had a meeting, probably within the last couple of months, I can't remember now, but I did talk to the group - I don't know if they were domestic sawmill operators or domestic woodcutters or who they were, I know one of them used to be a farmer. I don't know what he was doing with these guys, but anyway, the idea or the purpose of the meeting - I think there was one group from Lethbridge and one from Roddickton, and the concern was clear-cutting closer to or around local communities, and the need for some type of policy to try to have a sustainable use of the woods that are close to communities. Has the minister given that any consideration or do you have any policy direction on that right now?

MR. FLIGHT: The meeting, I think, to which the member refers was held in my office with a delegation from the Lethbridge - Bonavista area and their purpose was to ask me, as minister, to stop clear-cutting within eight kilometres of their communities. They had particular concern that we, ourselves, the Department of Forestry had actually gone down there last year, I guess, and done a clear-cut because, as far as I was concerned, it was a site reclamation, but they complained that we had actually cut good, virgin trees. Now, that is a debatable point, but that is beside the point.

I made one commitment to them that if they did not want the Department of Forestry in there clear-cutting or doing that kind of work, then we wouldn't do it anymore, we would do it somewhere else in Newfoundland, but it is purely site reclamation as far as we are concerned.

They wanted a commitment that there would be no more clear-cutting within eight kilometres of their community, and I say to the member, if I did that for the Bonavista Peninsula, if it was the right thing to do, then chances are, other areas in Newfoundland would want the same thing. I don't know why they wouldn't want it. And if I were to commit government policy that there would be no clear-cutting within eight kilometres of communities, it would pretty well effectively shut down the forest industry in Newfoundland. So I told them that. Although the newspapers said the next day, that I had committed myself to no clear-cutting, I hadn't, I just simply had committed myself to no government-funded clear-cutting.

They argued for - and by the way, I might say that some of the people there were sawmill loggers, and there were people who were simply concerned about the forests.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, the forests. They weren't sawloggers, they were environmentalists, and I don't say that in a derogatory way, but environmentalists in that sense. As a matter of fact, I had a map of the Bonavista Peninsula produced and we shaded in all the communities, eight-kilometer buffers or five miles around each community, and extended in major, major land mass and then you have to assume that if people in Bonavista North want that, then people in Bonavista South are going to demand it. The makeup of the communities are about the same. So, if we did the same thing, it would effectively stop a lot of the logging on the Bonavista Peninsula. They were insisting on selective cutting, as you know.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Wasn't their main emphasis on selective cutting, that their communities have existed in a forest environment for hundreds of years because they selectively cut? They cut the good trees and left the rest so they would be good some day and ready for cutting.

MR. FLIGHT: The problem is though, Bob, is that there is probably, on the Bonavista Peninsula, most of the junk forest in Newfoundland. Because, on the peninsula, there were times when they went in and cut the sawlogs and the pulp was left on the ground to rot because they couldn't get it to Abitibi-Price, or the paper companies weren't buying it, and the department approved their doing it. So there are some major problems with the forestry resource on the Bonavista Peninsula.

Select cutting: When we talk about clear-cut, most people think of British Columbia, Ontario, and what we see on TV. The size of our clear-cuts is nothing close to what is on the Bonavista Peninsula. I suggested to them, well, let's assume I do this, tell me, what will you have me say to your sawloggers where you employ eight or ten people in practically every community on the Bonavista Peninsula? It is a situation of trying to come to a happy medium.

As a matter of fact, only recently I met one of the people who had been at that meeting, and he wondered what progress we were making. I discussed it with him the way we are discussing it here now. And he knows there are problems. They know there are problems but they are hoping we will find that happy medium to avoid clear-cuts to the extent we can and to guarantee we manage the forests so that there will always be a cut, but it is a conflict, there is no question about that.

MR. R. AYLWARD: The sawmilling operations on the Bonavista Peninsula have more problems than that.

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, supply problems.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes. I think there was questioning in the House of Assembly a little while ago, by the Leader of the Opposition, or somebody, probably the New Democratic fellow, about some kind of new deals made with the paper companies on their limits to try to get the sawlogs. There were some deals made for exchanges but I think we were running out of exchange areas. Are there any other possibilities of getting those sawlogs before they are made into pulp?

MR. FLIGHT: On the exchange issue, as the Member for Humber knows, since I have been minister we have completed two exchanges, one in the Chouse Brook area which makes a major forest resource available to the sawmillers, particularly in his district. Now, we have completed another exchange within the Cormack area.

MR. R. AYLWARD: White's River Road.

MR. FLIGHT: That exchange is completed. We are talking all the time to the companies to do that. I have to say that Corner Brook Pulp and Paper has been more receptive, from my perspective, than Abitibi-Price has been.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Ron is gone now - you might get some work done.

MR. FLIGHT: That's right. Anyway, we are pursuing the exchange and we are also pursuing - but I do not want to give the wrong impression that we have any agreement or any understanding, it is a new concept and it is going to take a while to get the company to agree or to work out a way - we are talking about the possibility of having some, if not all, of the sawlogs that are produced on company limits, maybe even by company employees, diverted to the sawmilling industry. Lumber produced in this Province, as the member knows, has a lot more economic value than pulp, and one knows that you don't need sawlogs to produce pulp. But the byproduct, the rest of the tree, will produce the pulp. If we can be successful starting now, in the next year or two, to convince the companies and to work out an arrangement where we can actually take sawlogs off the company limits, then it will be a great boost to the sawmill industry.

MR. CHAIRMAN: It is 8:30 p.m. and usually we have a ten-minute break, so we will take ten minutes and you can take some time to ask your questions later.

MR. R. AYLWARD: I have only a couple more and I will finish then.

MR. CHAIRMAN: When we finished, the Member for Kilbride, Mr. Aylward, was in the processing of questioning, so we will ask him to continue.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Mr. Chairman, earlier tonight, the Member for St. John's South mentioned the agricultural development zone in the Northeast Avalon area and I, too, would like to ask some questions concerning that. It is certainly nothing new that you are going to hear tonight, but does the minister realize - I don't know if you have a good feeling for what is going on in there, and your ADM probably does have a fair feeling, but with the City of St. John's involved, and maybe this landowner's committee, although that is not an overly threatening group - does the minister realize that this is probably the beginning of the end of the agricultural development zone in the Northeast Avalon?

MR. FLIGHT: I realize it has the potential for being the beginning of the end and the member may be a self-fulfilling prophecy, but I am not prepared to permit it to be the beginning of the end. I am prepared, as minister, and this government is prepared to consider the legitimate concerns of the people, if there is a person who has a legitimate concern about a piece of land that is frozen and that will never be farmed because of other buildings around, or whatever.

The member may be right but I'm not prepared to take that position. I'm prepared to do a review of the zone and address the inequities and be fair but, in the final analysis, the agricultural arable land in the Northeast and in St. John's, the Goulds, Kilbride, Brookfield Road, will be protected. There is no question that the zone is under seige right now, led, in particular, by - I'm not really aware of what the council's position is; I know individual councillors - but the attack now is coming from that particular committee, as the member knows.

MR. R. AYLWARD: That committee is only one of five that I've dealt with since I've been a member for the area. It is not the committee that concerns me.

Two things, one that happened last year and one that is to take place next year, will dictate what is going to happen to that agricultural zone in the future. The first mistake we made was putting that area in the City of St. John's. That was a drastic mistake, whether the government will admit it or not. It definitely was a drastic mistake to put all of that area in the City of St. John's. It should have been, as was recommended by the committee doing the study, kept out of the City, out of any municipal boundary, and run by a development board or whatever was recommended. That has the greatest effect.

The next greatest effect is a project that has to be done. I don't know how - we are not going to be able to do it. But the Goulds bypass road will be the next that's going to destroy - well, it will be the next nail in the coffin of that agricultural development zone. It is going to split it in half. Once you split something like that in half then you have a boundary moved again. When the zone started, Brookfield Road was supposed to be the limit of development in the Newtown area, whatever you call that end of Mount Pearl. Then, when the arterial road was built, that became the boundary. Now, we'll have a bypass road that will become a boundary and, over the next five or six years, all of that land will be gone.

The most frightening part of it all, if any of the studies done by the department and AgCanada are true, which I can only assume they are, is that we have approximately 2 per cent of the land mass in this Province on which we can reasonably grow food. On 98 per cent of the land mass we can do anything else we want as long as it is properly zoned. That is the big problem. I don't know if the minister is courageous enough to recommend to his Cabinet that that zone be taken out of the City of St. John's, because that's the first step. If that's not done it is just as well to save yourself a lot of headaches and walk away from it, and move all of those farmers out to Deer Lake or Cormack or wherever there is a land base to support that type of industry. I guess Lethbridge would be the closest land base.

That would be my prediction right now. I'd fight it 'til the cows come home, as they say. But I think it's not being realistic. I thought up until amalgamation that it would be very realistic to protect that land. But I'm pretty sure now, because we have a group of people managing that now who don't understand at all what the agricultural development area is, and that's the Council in the City of St. John's. John Dinn is the front man on it, but John Dinn is only doing what he always believed in. I don't criticize John Dinn for what he's doing. He always had that point of view and I'll have to admire him for sticking up for his point of view. But the rest of the City Council down there have no idea of the importance or the need for that agricultural zone in this area.

My recommendation to the minister and to his department would be to take a Cabinet paper back to Cabinet and remove that immediately from the City of St. John's. That is the way to start it off. Then we have to go to work on the Goulds bypass road and get a proper environmental impact study and make sure that is built - and it can be built - so that it will have the least possible impact on that zone.

MR. FLIGHT: To the member, Mr. Chairman, I don't necessarily accept the fact that it was a mistake to amalgamate - because that's what we did - amalgamate the Goulds with St. John's. Our position as Agriculture was that legislation was in place to protect the zone and the legislation existing superseded anything that would be done as far as the City was concerned, and that the Goulds would amalgamate with St. John's. The zone was still in place, established and defined by legislation, and that would not change. Obviously, pressures would come on and they are coming on, but the legislation is still there.

With respect to taking a paper back to Cabinet to take the zone out, I suppose the right way to word that would be to take a paper back to Cabinet to take the Goulds back out of St. John's. I mean, if you took the zone out, you'd have little pieces intertwined with the Goulds. There is land on some of the major accesses in the Goulds that is in the zone, so how can you take the zone out without taking the Goulds out?

MR. R. AYLWARD: You could quite easily take it out. You might have to make some adjustments to it, which you're planning on doing anyway.

MR. FLIGHT: Okay, some adjustments.

MR. R. AYLWARD: You could go from the back line and immediately take out all that was in the Metroboard area. That would be the way to do it.

MR. FLIGHT: Okay, I accept, I suppose, if you said make some adjustments and draw straight lines and then say: What's left here now is the zone and we take it out. I still think it would be a pretty cumbersome undertaking.

MR. R. AYLWARD: That was the recommendation of your government's committee. That's not only my recommendation. That was the sensible thing to do. If you want to protect -

MR. FLIGHT: My government's committee?

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. FLIGHT: Which committee?

MR. R. AYLWARD: The Deputy Minister of Municipal Affairs happened to be chairperson of it, or the ADM.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) amalgamation committee.

MR. FLIGHT: Oh, I see what you're saying.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Amalgamation committee, yes.

MR. FLIGHT: Okay. Now, as far as the Goulds bypass is concerned, I am aware of the concept of the Goulds bypass. I've had discussions with other ministers. In the first instance, the member was quite right, that the Goulds bypass, as proposed, will have to undergo a full environmental assessment which may or may not see the Goulds bypass as it is envisioned now being built. I'm told there are alternate routes. Because, as the member knows, if the Goulds bypass is built where it is proposed, it cuts right through the prime agricultural land in the zone. So those will be considerations for the environmental assessment study.

I am told there are alternates. It may be a little more expensive, it may be a little longer or shorter or whatever, but there are alternate routes that will serve the same purpose inasfar as moving traffic is concerned. So all these things will be considered. But the member is right. If the Goulds bypass, as it has been proposed, is built, and it has major implications for the agriculture zone, I will see, and the department will see, that those concerns are addressed by agencies of the government before that point in time.

MR. R. AYLWARD: It would probably destroy all the farming on Brookfield Road.

MR. FLIGHT: On Brookfield Road (inaudible).

MR. R. AYLWARD: I would imagine that's a forgone conclusion. A lot of other area will be taken out, too, hundreds and hundreds of acres, probably almost as much as we have brought back in the land consolidation program.

The reason I raise the concern about the City, and the minister said he is not sure how the City feels -

MR. FLIGHT: Not in the sense that we haven't had an official position. I've talked to the Mayor, I don't mind telling the member, I've talked to different councillors. It is obvious, if you watch TV, there were certain councillors, as Mr. Dinn, for example - but we haven't had, or at least, I'm not aware that we have had a stated position. I would hope that the City's official position will be the maintenance of the agricultural zone.

MR. R. AYLWARD: The official position was indirectly stated and indirectly ruled upon last Friday, when a farmer who was operating in Kilbride in the City of St. John's since 1985 - he was operating before 1985. He was harassed and harassed and harassed by the City of St. John's, who actually, at one time, said they were going to put curb and gutter up in his fields, in his meadows, so the water wouldn't run out on the street, which will tell you what the City of St. John's knows about farming. He was harassed until he could not operate in that area anymore. I spent three years with your department trying to find him a spot to move within the zone. We did get him moved; we did get him a spot in the zone. He has been a year-and-a-half now with a permit from the Metroboard to move into that zone, and on Friday, he got a stop work order from the City of St. John's. So, if that's not what the City's intentions are, I don't know what they are. If you can't operate a farm in the agricultural zone, I certainly cannot operate a farm in the north-east Avalon.

MR. FLIGHT: Well, I have to say to the hon. member though, that that harassment took place long before amalgamation, certainly the most recent amalgamation, so if they were harassing then, it did not come as a result of the amalgamation he referred to.

MR. R. AYLWARD: It came from the last amalgamation so we should have learned something from it, but the trouble was the last amalgamation did not take in any of the zone, that is the difference.

MR. FLIGHT: But the hon. member knows that the Town Council of the Goulds itself, long before amalgamation, was not the friendliest in the world towards maintaining the zone as such. They wanted to have it both ways. They wanted to have the zone maintained but they wanted the ability to service land that they felt I should take out of the zone and service.

MR. R. AYLWARD: They wanted a review of it. That's what you're going to do now for the city council or for that land developers committee. That's all the Goulds committed were asking for. Pretty well.

MR. FLIGHT: They talked about specific sites as well to me.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Oh yes, I realize, and that's what you're going to do now. You're going to review it and look at specific sites.

MR. FLIGHT: It was driven by their desire - and I understand this from a municipality point of view - to generate revenue to run a town. I suppose that St. John's' argument will be that if we are going to provide the services and all the rest and the infrastructure in the Goulds, then we have a right to do whatever has to be done to have the Goulds part of the City generate municipal revenue.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Bylaws of the City of St. John's do not permit farms within their boundary. That's what the bylaws say. You can't even have a rooster. I don't know if you remember some time ago there was a rooster as a youngster's pet up on St. Clare Avenue that had to be taken out of the City because of the bylaws.

That is why I'm suggesting to the minister that for the protection of the zone, if it's important to protect -

MR. FLIGHT: No, it's worth considering.

MR. R. AYLWARD: - we should remove it and put it under a separate administration. I don't know what you'd call it.

MR. FLIGHT: Was there any consideration given to that?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Yes, Mr. Murphy?

MR. MURPHY: I know where the hon. member is coming from. Because he himself, as well as the Vice-chair, are two politicians now who work the soil.

MR. FLIGHT: I understand that, I appreciate that.

MR. MURPHY: Nobody has a better appreciation than somebody who did that.

MR. FLIGHT: I understand that.

MR. MURPHY: But I say to the hon. member we talk about food. It beckons the question: food for whom? I don't know how much of the Goulds is now planted, or what percentage of the Goulds is planted in root crop and/or surface crops, such as cabbage, brussels sprouts and what have you. I know it has intensified a bit.

MR. R. AYLWARD: 7 per cent (Inaudible).

MR. MURPHY: No, I'm only asking a question.

MR. R. AYLWARD: That's the answer to your question.

MR. MURPHY: Yes, I realize -

MR. R. AYLWARD: We produce 7 per cent so we'll have a land base that you should not destroy.

MR. MURPHY: I didn't interrupt the hon. member. So if he'd just let me go on. This land has gone down in value - historically the land in the Goulds, you know, fifty years ago it wasn't worth $100 an acre in there. I don't know if it was worth that. The hon. member knows this. Now he can get on with his heartthrob and his strings and all that. That's fine. I understand where he's coming from. But that land has been passed down from generation to generation like a lot of communities in Newfoundland.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Did they get it for agriculture or did they get it to build houses on?

MR. MURPHY: They got it for agricultural land.

MR. R. AYLWARD: So the zone didn't change on that land.

MR. MURPHY: No.

MR. R. AYLWARD: The zone is still the same.

MR. MURPHY: Fine.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Everyone in there now wants to change the zone, which is unfair to the farmer.

MR. MURPHY: I know where you're coming from and I appreciate it. But I'm sure that the hon. member understands that there are young people in there who have absolutely no intention of planting anything in the land that has been left to them. It's been hay land for time immemorial. It goes to dairy farmers and what have you and I'm not against that either. I'm just saying, in fairness to these young people who don't intend to plant it, if that land that has now become amalgamated into the City, and with the tremendous pressure on these young folks by developers to take over this agricultural land, and build whatever - from golf courses to condominiums, I have no idea - but they see all of a sudden a very large increase in value of the Goulds property.

MR. R. AYLWARD: I see a very large decrease in the value, actually.

MR. MURPHY: Well, it depends on how you look at it.

MR. R. AYLWARD: If a lot of land came on the market, that's just simply supply and demand.

MR. MURPHY: Fine.

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. MURPHY: Fine. I totally understand where the member is coming from. Okay? All I'm saying to the member is that time has changed the nature of the Goulds, and he admits it. I know he admits it.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Sure it does, yes, I don't disagree.

MR. MURPHY: Sure, okay. There is a tremendous amount of land in the Goulds that's nothing more than good old-fashioned hay land. Alright? It isn't foodstuff.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Probably I should argue it more in the House of Assembly to try and educate you, you do not understand the reason why it is planted in hay. The reason why it is planted in hay is because the landowner who does not want to use it can give it to a farmer and they can be exempt from property taxes. If the farmer owned the land it would not be hay as much as it is because he would rotate the crop, he would grow vegetables and then grow hay some other year.

MR. MURPHY: I do not understand it as well as the member but I do understand this, that there are a lot of young folks in there whose fathers and forefathers passed the land down to them and who do not have the same appreciation as the hon. member has, and/or some other residents do.

MR. R. AYLWARD: You are not trying to establish policy for the Province?

MR. MURPHY: I am trying to be fair to people and trying to be fair to the land, too. What I said in my opening remarks was that there is land in the Goulds that the minister committed to review that will never be agricultural land. The member knows that.

MR. R. AYLWARD: I support him on a review. I told him that.

MR. MURPHY: That is right. But, all of a sudden we want to protect it and that is fine, but there are a lot of things that the previous administration -

MR. R. AYLWARD: It is not all of a sudden. If the Aylwards had protected that when they were in there in the first place there would not be this problem. We are twenty years too late.

MR. MURPHY: Mr. Chairman, I know this is near and dear to the member but I am not going to get into an argument with him. I can bring up some of his former colleagues and governments that did not protect a lot of things, too, but we are not here to debate that.

MR. R. AYLWARD: They protected the agricultural land.

MR. MURPHY: The hon. member and I will debate that at great length in the House of Assembly, I am sure, but I just need to say to the minister that he needs also to understand that the hon. member's opinion, which I know is sincere and I know where he is coming from, but remember there are other people who have just as sincere an approach to their wishes. Now if somebody is going to offer these young people, who have fifty, sixty, and seventy acres, a decent price per acre to farm it, then I am sure these young folks would not mind selling the land, but there is nobody offering them that kind of money for farm land. They are offering it for something else and it is very, very tempting for young people who have just gotten married, thirty-three or thirty-four years of age with one or two children, who own a large block of land for somebody to come along and offer them a fair chunk of money for it, it is tough.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Well, tell them to sell it if somebody offers a fair chunk of money for the land. Tell them to sell it.

MR. MURPHY: Sell it for what, for farmland?

MR. R. AYLWARD: Sell it for whatever they were offered it for.

MR. MURPHY: They are not being offered it Bob because it is frozen. You and I know that. Unfreeze it and see what will happen.

MR. FLIGHT: I accept the advice of the hon. member for St. John's South in as far as I should respect the opinions of the hon. Member for Kilbride and the hon. Member for Humber. I think my performance in the House of Assembly as minister has been indicative of that over the years. I know that from a policy point of view and from an academic point of view they have had practically experiences.

MR. R. AYLWARD: (inaudible) as you were the other day, do not be a wimp like that fellow over there.

MR. FLIGHT: In the interest of levity, Mr. Chairman, I can get away with this and this may turn the committee sour. I have had, as the hon. Member for Kilbride knows, a lot of experience on the committee for the best part of fourteen years in the opposition and I did exactly what these two gentlemen are doing now, and I loved it, but I do not know what the debate this past ten or fifteen minutes has to do with the estimates.

MR. MURPHY: You are not being a wimp. When you have an underlying current inside yourself, that you are asking the City of St. John's - the member knows that the City of St. John's and the government are not going to 'unmalgamate'. They are not going to take away the amalgamation so he wants the constituents in St. John's South to have a mil rate shoved down their throat to provide the services for his constituents. That is what he is up to. There is no secret as to what the member is up to. Now we are into politics and we are not in the estimates so I will take it as it is and I will debate this with the member in the House.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Mr. Chairman, I have just one comment on that. What will happen now is that the City of St. John's taxpayers, including the ones in St. John's South, will have to foot 100 per cent of the services now. If it was under a government board they would not be footing 100 per cent because it would be a provincial responsibility. That is what I am trying to do, save your taxpayers some money which you are too narrow minded to even think about.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I think we are away from the estimates.

MR. MURPHY: You are right, Mr. Chairman. I totally agree.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Dumaresque, do you have a question?

MR. DUMARESQUE: No, no question, Mr. Minister.

MR. WOODFORD: I have just one comment, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Mr. Woodford.

MR. WOODFORD: Just one comment. I will bring it up so it will be legal under a question of where is the land consolidation money this year?

MR. FLIGHT: I think the consolidation is under 3.1.06, page 135 in the Estimates.

MR. HEWLETT: 3. 1.06.07

MR. WOODFORD: How come? You used to always have it under land consolidation, how come you now you have it - was there nothing last year under land consolidation?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, $400,000, the same amount, exactly.

MR. WOODFORD: Are you saying 3.1.07 or 3.1.06?

MR. FLIGHT: 3.1.06.

MR. WOODFORD: 3.1.06, okay, Land Development. So that is way down though from the previous year -

MR. FLIGHT: No, it is the same as last year.

AN HON. MEMBER: Same as '91 and '92.

MR. WOODFORD: Yes, but we put $500,000 in that the year before and $600,000 in the year before that; so she dropped down to $100,000 last year.

MR. FLIGHT: Pardon me?

MR. WOODFORD: She dropped down to $100,000 last year. Last year's estimates, the '90s estimates was -

MR. FLIGHT: Oh yes, yes, I am sorry. The hon. member is right. Last year there was $400,000 to purchase land under the Land Consolidation Program and there is $400,000 this year. It is greatly reduced from previous years as the hon. Member for Kilbride pointed out. I think it was last year and the year before. That is not a lack of commitment to purchase the land - it is a lack of funds to buy the land so the commitment this year is the same as last year, $400,000, and it is the result of the great financial straits in which we found ourselves in this past couple of years.

MR. WOODFORD: Can the minister tell me about the Goulds; was there ever a municipal plan in the Goulds?

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. FLIGHT: A municipal plan? The hon. member says yes and he would know.

MR. WOODFORD: And is there one there, today?

MR. R. AYLWARD: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: Under that municipal plan, was there anything to do with agriculture?

MR. FLIGHT: Well, I would defer to the deputy minister, the ADM of Agriculture, but I would say that any municipal plan in the Goulds, I suppose, since the zone was established, would have had to reflect the zone, would have had to indicate land that was in the zone and could not be used for anything other than agriculture. I would have to assume that.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Marty, would you like to have -

MR. HOWLETT: Yes. That is correct, Mr. Minister. The zone I guess, over the last couple of years has always been - there were some minor changes made to conform with the Town's plan, the Town of the Goulds at the time, and what was zoned agriculture by our department was the same as the town plan in the municipal plans.

MR. WOODFORD: In that plan you could have bridge zoning, but attached to the plan would be regulations. For instance in Cormac, everybody here tonight, the Member for St. John's South and the Member for Kilbride, and all the talk in the House last week, was that sons and daughters have a problem with building in areas under the municipal plan in the Province. I would say even in planning areas, have within their plan, with regulations attached to them, which gives a municipality the right and a farmer the right, even with a grant, to subdivide up to half an acre for a son or daughter.

Once that subdivision is done, the son or daughter, if he or she happens to sell it, will not be permitted another half an acre or an acre, but they are permitted half an acre within the municipal plan even though it is under a grant without a subdivision clause in it, can be given the right to build and that is enough for anyone. We are talking about a rural area now, half an acre, and that is only based on the Department of Health regulations of 20,000 square feet for a septic system, so in an urban area, really what you will be now is within the jurisdiction, could not the same thing apply to a place like the Goulds?

MR. FLIGHT: I understand that when the zone was established in the first place, that clause was there, that sons and daughters of the owners of the land could build on the land, however, as you said, once it was sold, they lost the right. Again, I will ask the ADM to briefly outline it but that was my understanding and I have heard it plenty of times and I presume it still exists.

MR. HOWLETT: When the zone came in there was a sons-and-daughters clause in the zone for a certain period of time in which they could apply to build a residence. If the son was working on a farm with the father in certain cases there would be a second house allowed if he was married -

MR. WOODFORD: Farmhouse.

MR. HOWLETT: - and what have you. What's happened I guess over the years, with the regulations and some changes being made, the sons-and-daughters clause is still there, but we've moved now to an impact assessment process. Through that impact assessment process that is one of the factors that's there. But if it comes out as a high impact on agriculture, a negative impact, or low impact or medium , which would be the gray area, the same rules are applied. High impact in all likelihood, unless a guy has to live on that farm, he may not be allowed to put another house on the farm. So we have had cases that there has probably been one or two or three houses on farms. Okay? So it's part of the impact assessment right now, the sons-and-daughters clause.

MR. WOODFORD: Why would the sons-and-daughters clause be applicable in another area of the Province? Are you talking about impact with regards to proximity or numbers?

MR. HOWLETT: No. What'll happen, when the impact assessment is done, Environment says that 2,000 feet radius of wells and so forth, servicing, closeness to farm buildings, suitability to soil, all of that goes into the assessment. It's not just one factor any more, like the sons-and-daughters clause. It goes in the assessment, the assessment is done. It's a computer model that's been developed and then that'll come out and say it has a high, medium or low impact on agriculture, and here are the reasons why.

MR. WOODFORD: That same thing is applicable in Cormack. Same thing is applicable. Because we talked about environmental, health and transportation regulations. They're there anyway from each government department. It just so happens that in regards to a farm, I think it is 2,000 from the nearest building. We ran into that. But it was no trouble to accommodate someone building on a particular farm with fifty, sixty or seventy acres. So what I am talking about is working somewhere else, albeit I can see some changes going to have to be made in the next few years with regards to the regulations part of the plan. It's the only argument I'm hearing, that's what I'm getting. All I'm getting is people can't build.

MR. FLIGHT: What I would say to the member is that I have some doubts as to whether or not we should have allowed the term that the ADM uses. I think that the sons-and-daughters clause should have stayed and be overriding, regardless maybe. But obviously there have been changes made to the zone, there have been changes made to the policy administering the zone, and in these policy changes somehow or other viability or - what's the word?

AN HON. MEMBER: Impact.

MR. FLIGHT: Impact assessment and other factors overrode the sons-and-daughters clause, and maybe we should have never have let that happen.

MR. R. AYLWARD: Seventy per cent of the applications have nothing to do with the sons-and-daughters clause.

MR. FLIGHT: That's a fact.

MR. WOODFORD: I would say that all of the parcels of land in the Goulds, except for some in the last five or six years, or seven or eight years, is granted property.

MR. FLIGHT: Probably.

MR. WOODFORD: Not leased. Leases only came in eight or nine years ago with the conditions attached, and even some of the grants had the non-subdivision clause in them. So I've known land in the Province that were subdivided against the municipal plan and against the contents of a grant or lease. Even a grant. I've seen properties in the Province, as high as 100 acres, taken back from the individual if he subdivided against the wishes of the grant.

So if this is all granted property that is something that could be used in there. Now it's probably not the right thing to do and it is certainly not the political thing to do, but it has been done. As Bob has mentioned earlier, it was given in the first place for agriculture. Now I think really the government has two choices. If they lift the zone and the freeze, the land is gone and gone forever, and they're going to have to relocate every farm out there. The cost of relocating a dairy farm, I can assure you, is at a minimum, half a million. You're talking about $10,500 per animal unit now. So anyone out there with 100 cows, no trouble to make it out, you have $1 million, so that is one thing to take into consideration. You can spend all night on that but I have an awful lot of questions here, as other members do, and I do not see how we are going to get through it now. Resource roads, under forestry, 2.6.03. Purchased Services, I would say that is resource roads.

MR. FLIGHT: Purchased Services: that is for tenders let for construction of resource roads.

MR. WOODFORD: What roads will you be doing this year? Will you be extending the Chouse Brook one? Will you be doing anything with the Whites Road-Bridges Pond one?

MR. FLIGHT: I would expect we will probably be extending Chouse, I am not sure, and Whites Road I would suspect. I would be surprised if there is not an allocation there. The rest are all over the Province.

I should not tell the hon. member this because it will be running in the press tomorrow or the next day.

MR. WOODFORD: Well, you do not have to. I can ask you in the House tomorrow.

MR. FLIGHT: The amounts will be tendered but we are predicting approximately five kilometers on the Whites River Road and approximately a kilometre and a half on the Chouse Brook Road. See how good I am to the hon. member.

MR. WOODFORD: It is a good project. I would say then those tenders will be called fairly soon.

MR. FLIGHT: Exactly. Very shortly.

MR. WOODFORD: To put all jokes aside it is good to have those out early, especially with woods roads where you have to have a type C road before the Fall, the frost, the snow, and everything like that, because you have an awful mess if you do not. Those are two worthwhile projects I might say to the minister, the Chouse Brook one and again the Whites River one.

MR. FLIGHT: Both those roads I say to the member are class B which is higher still than C.

MR. WOODFORD: Class B, that is what I meant, which is higher.

Under 2.6.04 (06) resource road construction, Purchased Services.

MR. FLIGHT: The $235,000, 2.6.04 (06), is funded under the Labrador agreement so obviously all activity will be in Labrador. It is for the contracted construction services to provide for the purchase of materials and the construction of resource roads in the Labrador region; experimental portable bridge; experimental multi-plate arch bridge; experimental aggregate project and bridge; Burnt Ridge resource road extension; alternative pond construction trails; experimental low-class roads; Cartwright resource roads; and Mills Lake Road reconstruction. So it's projects in Labrador funded under the Labrador Agreement.

I might take this opportunity to point out to the committee that although it is budgeted and we want to spend it, it may not be totally spent, depending on the management committee and the success we have in resolving some of our problems with the native claims.

MR. WOODFORD: 2.7.01 (06), budgeted $120,000, spent $511,000 and $100,000 this year. What would that be on?

MR. FLIGHT: What is that?

MR. WOODFORD: 2.7.01 (06), forest renewal, on top of the next page.

MR. FLIGHT: I will read it off to the member. It is Purchase Services, vehicle and equipment maintenance, seed collection, seed extraction and stand reclamation.

MR. WOODFORD: So that is where we extract seeds from Wooddale. So there will be a cone picking program this year, will there? Will it be any more extensive than it was last year?

MR. FLIGHT: In Millertown.

MR. WOODFORD: Just in Millertown.

MR. FLIGHT: Just in case he did not hear me.

MR. WOODFORD: Any cone picking for the west coast?

MR. FLIGHT: Are we going to have a cone picking program this year?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. FLIGHT: We did not have one last year and I presume we will be doing some this year.

MR. WOODFORD: Why would you pick them all in one place, why do you not spread the jobs around?

MR. FLIGHT: Oh, use your imagination there now, Rick. We try to spread it around between Millertown and Buchans Junction and just above Badger. Seriously Rick, even though the money is budgeted, we cannot say for certain that there will be a collection, most likely there will be cones collected wherever it is obvious the better supply cones are at any given time and forestry people will identify this.

MR. WOODFORD: And you have identified that the Millertown area would be a better supplier of cones?

MR. DUMARESQUE: You should collect them in Labrador since we have such a yield on them. You might be able to get them to grow the way they do in Labrador. I would even volunteer to pick a few for you.

MR. A. SNOW: Just to elaborate on 2.6.04 (06), back to the question that you answered a few minutes ago, Mr. Minister. You listed off names of lakes or locations of access roads -

MR. FLIGHT: Yes. Do you want me to do it again?

MR. A. SNOW: Yes. They are all in Labrador, correct?

MR. FLIGHT: Oh yes, because it is funded under the Labrador Agreement.

MR. A. SNOW: Is there one in Western Labrador?

MR. FLIGHT: On the Coast of Labrador, yes.

MR. A. SNOW: Is one of the roads there in Western Labrador? No?

MR. FLIGHT: I do not think so boy. It provides for the purchase of materials to construct resource roads in the Labrador region. Burnt Ridge resource road extension?

MR. A. SNOW: No, Mills Lake.

MR. FLIGHT: That is up Northwest River. Alternative road construction trails, Mills Lake road reconstruction -

MR. A. SNOW: That is in Labrador.

MR. FLIGHT: - and Cartwright resource road. It is in Labrador but is it in Western Labrador?

MR. A. SNOW: Well, there is a Mills Lake. Can you find it -

MR. FLIGHT: I cannot off the top of my head.

DR. NAZIR: I think we have done some work there but we have run into difficulty with the native issue.

MR. A. SNOW: In Western Labrador?

MR. FLIGHT: Okay. What the ADM is saying here, is that we have budgeted $235,000 because we wanted that much work. The management committee has not approved those roads yet and one of the problems the management committee is running into now is determining the native land claims negotiations. I would draw to the member's attention that last fall the forestry work in Labrador in Mills Lake was shut down. We had $300,000 worth of work going on within fifteen miles I would guess, or less, of Goose Bay itself and we had to shut down that work, and now one of the problems is before we start up that kind of work we have to make sure that we are doing it with the co-operation or the understanding of the Native People's. So I have to tell the member that this work is funded under the Coastal Labrador Agreement. Now does the Coastal Labrador agreement provide funding for Western Labrador? It seems to me to be the obvious question.

AN HON. MEMBER: No, it is comprehensive (inaudible).

MR. A. SNOW: It is comprehensive Labrador.

MR. FLIGHT: Well all I can say to the member, is that the Mills Lake Road reconstruction - that is the only thing that would be in Western Labrador if it is there, and I will determine it tomorrow if he wishes, and advise him.

MR. A. SNOW: I would appreciate it; and there has not been any protest in Western Labrador, native protest or -

DR. NAZIR: But it is part of their claim area. As long as that is part of the claim area, federal officials will very (inaudible).

MR. A. SNOW: There are more highways being built over in Western Labrador and road construction in Western Labrador than probably anywhere else in the Province and they have not been in there protesting yet, so I doubt if they are going to come in over this one.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I would like to bring the members back to the Estimates. We have some for agriculture.

MR. WOODFORD: 3.1.07.10: Grants and Subsidies, Environmental Sustainability Initiative. Is that the new federal-provincial agreement on the manure handling facilities?

MR. FLIGHT: That's the Province's share of the $1 million subsidiary agreement, or environmental sustainability. It's funded 50-50. The Province provides 50 per cent and the feds provide the other 50 per cent.

MR. WOODFORD: 3.2.02, Market Development, 3.2.02.10.

MR. FLIGHT: 3.2.02.10.

MR. WOODFORD: Grants and Subsidies.

MR. FLIGHT: That's the one.

MR. WOODFORD: That's where the school milk program is?

MR. FLIGHT: I'm delighted to tell the hon. member that is the program that he wanted to get started and committed himself to during the election of spring, 1989 -

MR. WOODFORD: It was more than that though, but anyway.

MR. FLIGHT: - and couldn't deliver, but I'm very proud to say that -

MR. WOODFORD: But it was more than this, that's why I wanted to ask.

MR. FLIGHT: - this minister delivered that program. That is our commitment this year to the school milk program.

MR. WOODFORD: It can't be totally.

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. FLIGHT: No, he's talking about the - okay.

MR. WOODFORD: 3.2.02.10.

MR. FLIGHT: One hundred and fifty thousand dollars is the school milk program.

MR. WOODFORD: Fifty thousand?

MR. FLIGHT: One hundred and fifty thousand.

MR. WOODFORD: One hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The rest would be what?

MR. FLIGHT: The rest would be... assistance is provided to producers. Producer groups, marketing organizations, companies, for produce related to agricultural marketing and promotions. Assistance is normally provided at 50 per cent of the cost to a maximum of $2,000 per project. A grant to the secretariat for three federal-provincial committees. Trade policy and market development, and food inspection for $1,500. This secretary is cost-shared 50 per cent by the federal government and 50 per cent by the Province. So that's $18,000 over and above the $150,000 for the school milk program. I am sure that the member will want to commend the government for that school milk program.

MR. WOODFORD: On that same one, would for instance agricultural fairs and so on come under that particular heading or would it come under production subsidies or something like that? Not production, production and marketing.

MR. FLIGHT: No. Although we provide grants to agricultural fairs, small grants. I suppose that is pretty well discretionary. But it's not in that particular head, is it?

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. FLIGHT: 3.6.01.10.

MR. WOODFORD: Administration.

MR. FLIGHT: Yes. Grants and Subsidies, $10,000, $15,000.

MR. WOODFORD: What would happen there for it to be budgeted at $378,000 and then just use $7,300 last year, and now budget $15,000?

MR. FLIGHT: Explain that, Mr. ADM.

MR. HOWLETT: We had some money that we just put through that subhead in grants which would have been federal dollars out to producers. Len, you can help me on this one. I think that's where we put $350,000?

MR. FLIGHT: We got a grant from the federal government to assist the fur industry. What I'm hearing here is that it was put -

MR. HOWLETT: It was income support.

MR. FLIGHT: Income support from -

MR. HOWLETT: Federal dollars that we actually flow through our budget.

MR. FLIGHT: One hundred per cent -

MR. HOWLETT: And 100 per cent comes back from....

MR. WOODFORD: Well, what...?

MR. HOWLETT: It shows up there, the revenue back would have been $257,600. Federal.

MR. WOODFORD: Yes.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. WOODFORD: Yes, that's my question. It was budgeted, but I'm asking, where is it now? It was budgeted last year, revised downward, it's not in the budget, actually budgeted this year, but showing where the federal....

MR. HOWLETT: It was a one year program.

MR. WOODFORD: So where's the money now?

MR. HOWLETT: Income support for one year.

MR. WOODFORD: So it did go out last year?

MR. HOWLETT: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: Well, how come it's not shown going out?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, it's budgeted at $378,000 and (Inaudible) -

AN HON. MEMBER: Because under the revised -

MR. WOODFORD: But it's not under revised, that's what I'm saying. Usually if it goes out it's under revised.

AN HON. MEMBER: Show him the revised figure.

AN HON. MEMBER: It's not very clear.

MR. FLIGHT: I can say to the member that I'll undertake to get this clarified for him tomorrow and get the explanation, because I don't understand it myself. I could almost accept it as a typographical error but it's not.

MR. WOODFORD: I'll name two: Humber Valley agricultural fair, Harbour Grace agricultural fair. How much money went to those two places last year with regards to a grant towards the fair?

MR. FLIGHT: I think the Harbour Grace fair, if I remember correctly, was $2,500.

AN HON. MEMBER: $2,000.

MR. FLIGHT: The Harbour Grace fair was $2,000, off the top of my head because I was there and presented it, I think.

MR. WOODFORD: Yes, you were.

MR. FLIGHT: I cannot tell the hon. member what the Western or -

MR. WOODFORD: The Humber Valley one?

MR. FLIGHT: - the Humber Valley, yes.

MR. HOWLETT: (Inaudible) probably a little more. That $15,000 goes to all the small fairs around the Province; there are seven or eight small ones.

MR. WOODFORD: Could you get the Humber Valley figure for me tomorrow?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: 3.3.04, Mr. Minister.

MR. FLIGHT: 3.3.04? Before we leave, I want to make clear to the committee that it is obviously difficult to understand 3.6.01 (10). I will have a detailed and clarified response for the member tomorrow, as quickly as it can be obtained.

MR. WOODFORD: 3.3.04, Grants and Subsidies, budgeted $ 83,000 but yet spent $200,000 and now $620,000. I know there is probably some federal money in it, probably 75 per cent of federal money in it, but what was it for?

MR. FLIGHT: That is the one that was for the fur farmers. It was a pass through from the feds for the fur price support program, that is what that one is for.

MR. WOODFORD: So then the one to which I referred in 3.2.06, is certainly not fur again, is it?

MR. FLIGHT: Not unless there is another one.

MR. HOWLETT: There was a 1990 income support for fur and there was a 1991 income support for fur. The $483 is that 1991 contribution by the feds and $300 and some odd in the other one is the 1990, because they pay them on the previous year. Those are the figures that they use.

MR. WOODFORD: The $483 was 1991 and the $378 was 1990, did you say?

MR. HOWLETT: It would have been paid on the 1990 fur crop year, okay?.. and the $483 would be on the 1991 figures just being paid.

MR. WOODFORD: Now could you get that for me tomorrow?

MR. FLIGHT: There is no problem with the 3.3.04, there is no question because that $483 was -

MR. WOODFORD: Yes, because it shows that.

MR. FLIGHT: - it shows that it was passed through the federal government -

MR. WOODFORD: Yes, and it will pass through this year, but on the other one, it shows -

MR. FLIGHT: - but I will get an acceptable explanation for the hon. member.

MR. WOODFORD: Farm Development Loan Board. Last year in 3.3.06, $2,240,000 was budgeted for farm loans, which was a drop, but you spent $1.84 million and now there is $2,500,000 in it for this year. If I am not mistaken the ALFI and the Agri-Foods Agreements all ran out last year, there was an extension for ALFI and the Agri-Foods, so are you expecting a real increase in the Farm Development Loan Board, because there is no agreement -

MR. FLIGHT: The Agri-Foods Agreement does not run out until March of 1993. The ALFI Agreement ran out -

MR. WOODFORD: ALFI ran out last year and you extended the year.

MR. FLIGHT: - yes, and we had an extension, but the Agri-Foods Agreement does not run out until March of 1993.

MR. WOODFORD: How much is left in that?

MR. FLIGHT: How much is left in it? I do not know how much it is but the ADM tells me it is totally committed.

MR. WOODFORD: It is totally committed?

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: But why would Agri-Foods Initiatives have hardly anything budgeted for Agri-Foods last year and up $1.7 million this year?

MR. FLIGHT: Where?

MR. WOODFORD: Under 3.6.05.

MR. FLIGHT: 3.6.05, Agri-Foods Initiatives.

MR. WOODFORD: Well, $1.5 million was budgeted last year, but $1.1 million was spent under Agri-Foods, now it is $1.7

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: I did not think there was that much money left in that agreement, where is it coming from?

MR. FLIGHT: It had better be left there if we had budgeted for it. We just increased the funding a little bit in 1991 to use everything up, I would presume.

MR. HOWLETT: It works on a producer's five year farm plan. So that figure can be up and down, okay? So that would be the balance that would be left that is committed between now and when the program expires for March of 1993. Then we have a period of time to clue up and so forth, as you know.

MR. FLIGHT: Even though it's committed that would be the amount of services that has been left in the agreement so we would be sure to spend it all.

MR. WOODFORD: While you are there on that one - I just back up to ALFI. 3.6.04. Is that the remaining - because ALFI was extended last year, and is there $1.2 million left in that for this year?

MR. HOWLETT: That would be the year carryover. We really have two years to clue up, spend the funding, and the extension is roughly $820,000.

MR. WOODFORD: That's all committed?

MR. HOWLETT: The $820,000 is not. We're just assessing applications now. The extension money.

MR. WOODFORD: Based on the extension.

MR. HOWLETT: That's right. That's why you see an increase in the loan board, because of anticipated demand because of the ALFI extension of roughly $850,000.

MR. WOODFORD: That extension is coming from March of 1991, isn't it?

MR. HOWLETT: That extension expires in September.

MR. WOODFORD: Of this year.

MR. HOWLETT: Of this year.

MR. WOODFORD: Yes, but there were no monies last summer under the ALFI agreement.

MR. HOWLETT: Only the carryover.

MR. WOODFORD: Only the bit of carryover from the year before. So really, this is an extension from 1991.

MR. FLIGHT: From September of 1991.

MR. WOODFORD: Yes.

AN HON. MEMBER: Yes.

MR. HOWLETT: Well, (Inaudible) -

MR. WOODFORD: There were no new monies last year.

MR. HOWLETT: That's right. We did not get the agreement signed till September. But in the terms of the agreement it is from March of 1991 to September of 1992.

MR. WOODFORD: Yes. But now you've got till September 1993 to spend it.

MR. HOWLETT: Well, the carryover.

MR. WOODFORD: The carryover. What about the status of a new agreement, Minister? A new ALFI agreement.

MR. FLIGHT: The status, I will tell the hon. member, is that we have our people and the federal people talking about an agreement -funding levels and what our priorities are in the agreement - under such an agreement.

MR. WOODFORD: Nothing on the table? Nothing?

MR. FLIGHT: No amount on the table, just the parameters of the agreement, what we want to see, our priorities under the agreement. Of course, the feds have their priorities. Now it's a case of trying to get the maximum level of funding under the agreement.

MR. WOODFORD: Are there any negotiations taking place now for a new agreement?

MR. FLIGHT: The member would know that the ALFI agreement is a maritime or Atlantic provinces agreement as such and is being negotiated as I understand (Inaudible) the same. We negotiate it as an Atlantic provinces agreement, as opposed to a provincial agreement. The question was: are there negotiations ongoing? There are. There are negotiations ongoing.

MR. WOODFORD: A new Agri-Foods agreement, is it?

MR. FLIGHT: There are negotiations ongoing with the new Agri-Food agreement?

SOME HON. MEMBERS: (Inaudible).

MR. FLIGHT: My officials tell me, Rick, that we are just preparing our positions now, that we haven't actually sat down to negotiate the agreement. We are getting a handle on what our negotiation position is and what our priorities are and what we want under the agreement. So there have been no actual negotiations on the agreement.

MR. WOODFORD: Is there any movement on the red meat inspection program? Has there been anything new on that?

MR. FLIGHT: There's no movement that I can be definite and say: expect such-and-such a thing to happen. It is becoming more important to more farmers from all over Newfoundland. The solution would appear to be a partial solution to some of their problems.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible) consultant study.

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, we have a consultant study going on establishing red meat inspection on a provincial basis.

MR. WOODFORD: Is there a consultant doing it now, the study on that program? How long has that study been in place now?

MR. HOWLETT: About two months right now I would say.

MR. WOODFORD: When are you supposed to submit your report?

MR. HOWLETT: I could not give you exactly the time frame but there is a time frame in the contract. I think we gave them somewhere between three and four months to have a report completed and in. In that report we will look at the areas of the Province that meat inspection is required in. We will look at the cost of that meat inspection, the setup and staff requirements and so forth.

MR. WOODFORD: Mr. Minister, the task force that has been formed on agriculture was hailed as one of the greatest task forces in recent times and there is no question that it is an industry that can be expanded on and production increased in the Province. Would you explain why there has been no action on that? The task force itself was self explanatory and where I am coming from a lot of the recommendations in the task force could be acted on rather quickly. Why would there be a need for another Cabinet committee to do a study of the study itself?

MR. FLIGHT: There have been certain actions taken on the task force report but I will tell the member that in areas where recommendations were purely policy recommendations and required amendments to legislation and that kind of thing, we are pursuing that and looking at policy changes. The Milk Marketing Board for argument sake, the pricing allocation committee, the allocation and milk pricing recommendations that are now in place are pretty well what was recommended by the task force, but in as far as their major recommendations carry considerable cost government decided to have, not a committee of Cabinet as the member referred to, but we struck a committee of senior civil servants, senior level senior servants, the ADM level, to review and recommend to me what action should be taken on certain recommendations in the task force report.

This past six months the senior review committee have looked at the hog industry and the recommendations relating to the hog industry, the chicken industry - Newfoundland Farm Products - and that is basically all they have dealt with. I can tell the member they are finished with their deliberations, their recommendations from that review committee to me, and sooner as opposed to later government will take action on the recommendations. It is a complicated job. The recommendation from the task force was that this should happen. Then, of course, the price tag had to be attached to the effect on the agricultural community if we took certain actions. That has been the situation Mr. Vice-Chair. The recommendations of the task force have been reviewed by a senior review committee. They have basically finished their work on these three sectors, have made their recommendation to me and in the next little while government will be dealing with those recommendations. That same review committee is now moving into other sectors of the industry as recommended or dealing with the recommendations made by Dr. Hulan's report.

MR. WOODFORD: So what you are saying is that that particular committee studied the hog, poultry and broilers?

MR. FLIGHT: The review committee.

MR. WOODFORD: Yes.

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: And Farm Products?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes.

MR. WOODFORD: Three commodities in one.

MR. FLIGHT: The hog industry, the broiler industry and the Newfoundland Farm Products. Three.

MR. WOODFORD: - poultry and Newfoundland Farm Products?

AN HON. MEMBER: Not the eggs.

MR. FLIGHT: Not the eggs. The operation of Newfoundland Farm Products, the hog industry and the broiler industry.

MR. WOODFORD: Yes, so there were three commodities, and the operations of -

MR. FLIGHT: No, two commodities.

MR. WOODFORD: Did you not say the eggs?

MR. FLIGHT: No. We said: not the eggs, hog, broiler and Newfoundland farm products.

MR. WOODFORD: Okay, two commodities and Newfoundland Farm Products; so that is what their job was up to now, to look after those three and now they are going into the rest of the report?

MR. FLIGHT: Yes, or they are going into other recommendations. I cannot think of them off the top of my head.

AN HON. MEMBER: Departmental structure.

MR. FLIGHT: Okay. They are about to go into and advise me on the recommendations from the report or make recommendations based on the recommendations in the report on the dairy industry and departmental structure.

MR. WOODFORD: So that should not take as long?

MR. FLIGHT: Probably not, no, I would not think.

MR. WOODFORD: I mean, it is one of the areas you stated in your opening statement - in fact we were the only province in Canada, last year that farm cash receipts grew by I think, 3.7 per cent and it is an area where you can do something and in some cases without a great lot of funding, create new jobs and long-term, not just seasonal work, not just ten weeks work or twelve weeks work, you are talking about people working year-round and it is an industry that can be expanded. The report is on the desk and a lot of the recommendations in it can be initiated fairly quickly, that was my point, so I would submit to the minister that he, especially next year, could submit next year's budget to accommodate some of those recommendations and get something moving in that particular industry.

Has anybody else any questions, I am not going to hog the time.

AN HON. MEMBER: (Inaudible).

MR. WOODFORD: Yes, go ahead then.

MR. MURPHY: No. I was just wondering, Mr. Minister, what is the status of ATVs in wetlands?

MR. FLIGHT: That is totally a responsibility of the Minister of Environment and Lands, although I dealt with it when I was acting minister.

MR. MURPHY: Okay.

MR. FLIGHT: But no, the Department of Environment and Lands might well go to any resource department and ask for input, but it is purely a decision of that Department.

MR. MURPHY: I was not sure if it was under the Ministry of Environment and Land or your Department; that was the only thing I was interested in.

MR. FLIGHT: I can understand the member because I was acting minister for five months when we were dealing with the -

MR. MURPHY: Yes, you and I discussed it, Mr. Minister.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Larry?

MR. SHORT: I just have one quick question on the Green plan; what is the status or what is the federal government going to do with it this year in terms of tree planting and -

MR. FLIGHT: We are not 100 per cent sure yet, I say to the member, but we think that under the Green Plan this year the Green Plan will permit us to plant about a million trees in the Province through town councils, civic groups, whatever, and we will co-ordinate it and use our nurseries as the source for the seedlings.

MR. SHORT: Is that going to expand next year?

MR. FLIGHT: It is a five year plan.

MR. SHORT: We were anticipating a lot more than that, a million more, weren't we?

MR. FLIGHT: This year?

MR. SHORT: Yes.

MR. FLIGHT: They're not going to go beyond $1 million this year and we don't really know - we assume there will be no reduction. One would think there would be an increase next year. But it's $1 million this year.

MR. WOODFORD: Another one I meant to ask on was Roddickton, that company in Roddickton. Are they going to clear-cut?

MR. FLIGHT: Most likely.

MR. WOODFORD: Most likely. Will they be responsible for a silviculture program after clear-cutting?

DR. NAZIR: If they are under an annual cutting permit which they are right now then the Crown is responsible for silviculture.

MR. FLIGHT: They pay stumpage.

DR. NAZIR: They pay stumpage. But if they get a long-term agreement or a license then they are responsible for silviculture. But they haven't applied for a long-term license. They are being given wood under a cutting permit like any other sawmill and that is the responsibility of the Crown.

MR. WOODFORD: I suppose I know what the answer is going to be. Why would they be given a permit like that? Especially with so much going out.

MR. FLIGHT: One hundred thousand board feet a year, they're going to harvest.

MR. WOODFORD: One hundred thousand?

MR. FLIGHT: They're required to harvest (Inaudible) cubic metres.

DR. NAZIR: Out of 100,000 cubic metres of log being cut in that unit they are being given only 20,000 cubic metres.

That they will be purchasing from various other sawmillers and various other permit holders. So instead of trying to convert the existing permit holders into a license we felt it would be more advisable to continue with the existing permit system and not display the existing (Inaudible).

MR. WOODFORD: Does the Crown have any plans to make sure that place is silvicultured?

MR. FLIGHT: We have done silviculture work in Roddickton. Roddickton gets its share of silviculture expenditure every year.

As the deputy says, one of the best natural regeneration areas in the Province is Roddickton. We have been doing a lot of thinning in that area as well as planting. Of course, if the cut increases as a result of (Inaudible) being located there then we would have to look at expanding the silviculture program there. But again, you have to work with the dollars that are available and make sure that the wood being cut on the Chouse Brook area needs silviculture as well, as well as the Bay d'Espoir area, or as well as Central Newfoundland. But the level of the cut in the Roddickton area will determine the level of silviculture.

MR. WOODFORD: Just one short question. I wonder could the minister just give us an update on Kruger and Abitibi as a whole in the Province. Are there any other reasons for concern as of today?

MR. FLIGHT: No, there's obviously reason for concern. The paper industry internationally is in difficult times. As far as Abitibi-Price is concerned people tend to relate O&Y's problems to what affect that will have on Abitibi-Price since Olympia and York owns Abitibi-Price, or 82 per cent. But from the local management's point of view they're producing a quality sheet. They're not predicting any major downtime. Corner Brook Pulp and Paper is still reporting a loss up to this point in time. But we're hoping that the Canadian dollar stays down or drops a bit further and that the market generally improves and the discounting stops. There is dumping going on, as the member would know, in the world markets and it is depressing the prices and making it very difficult for paper companies like Abitibi and Kruger to compete.

But they're having the same difficulties as every other paper mill in the country is experiencing. As the member will know there have been machines shut down in Canada these past two or three months, there have been full mills closed. There is no reason to believe at this point in time based on any knowledge we have - and the paper companies in the Province continue to update us, not day-to-day, but certainly week-to-week. They're confident that they'll maintain their level of production and ride out this downturn in the economy, in the paper industry, and go on from there.

MR. WOODFORD: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Further questions?

MR. MURPHY: Mr. Chairman, if there are no further questions I would move that we accept items 1.1.01 to 3.6.05, inclusive.

On motion, Department of Forestry and Agriculture, total heads, carried.

MR. CHAIRMAN: I would like to again thank the minister and his officials for coming to the Committee and providing answers for the forthright questions that were asked. I would also like to thank the Committee members who did a good job of questioning and receiving information. The tenor of the meeting has been great and I really appreciate that. I appreciate the work of Elizabeth setting it up, and the Page, and also the recorder. So again, thanks very much for attending. We appreciate it.

MR. FLIGHT: Might I say, Mr. Chairman, in closing, I on behalf of my staff appreciate the civil atmosphere in which we did these estimates. I just want to confirm to members of the Committee the undertaking I made to provide the answers to questions that we could not answer tonight, most likely tomorrow.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much.

MR. WOODFORD: I would like, Mr. Chairman, on behalf of my Committee and all Committee members to thank the minister and his officials for being so forthright. I guess that is what makes these committees work. That's what we are here for, to ask questions on the estimates and anything else. I find it a very relaxed atmosphere to ask questions pertaining to your district or pertaining to any other area of the Province you may be interested in, rather than in the House of Assembly where you usually get something else. So once again, Mr. Minister, and your officials, thank you.

The Committee adjourned.