Strategic Context

Three factors are anticipated as key drivers for the bureau over the next three years:

• the need for provincial ministries and agencies to act corporately to achieve government goals, including economic development that is balanced with sustainable environmental management. The bureau, along with many provincial government agencies, is engaged in the achievement of a number of cross-government priorities, such as preparing for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games and responding corporately to the Mountain Pine Beetle epidemic;
• continued high North American and international market demands for natural resources, particularly energy resources, resulting in requests to the bureau to facilitate access to a wide range of natural resources and to plan for, and allocate, Crown land to meet the needs of communities, First Nations and economic development; and
• government’s commitment to implementing a New Relationship with First Nations, which will provide opportunities to improve the well-being of First Nations and non-First Nations alike in British Columbia.

Opportunities and Challenges

These key drivers present the bureau with a number of opportunities and challenges in each of its core businesses. Strategies to exploit these opportunities and manage the challenges are described under the section on Goals, Objectives, Strategies and Results (p. 46).

Regional Client Services

Opportunities

Clients seeking access to provincial natural resources have indicated a need for a “single-point-of-contact” to ensure full disclosure of the process, steps and costs they face in order to reduce runaround times between agencies and to streamline and integrate application processes. Different clients require different service channels, however (face-to-face, phone, fax, e-mail, web and mail). Interviews with representatives of related government organizations in other jurisdictions have also identified clear benefits from such single-point-of-contact services (SPCS) and cross-government integration to both clients and government.⁸

The bureau’s FrontCounter BC offices will result in:

• reduced duplication of information requests;
• full disclosure of requirements, process steps and costs, and hence better informed applicants;
• reduced duplication of government efforts;
• higher levels of satisfaction with government agencies dealing with natural resources;
• better resource-use proposals from clients;
• better access to, and use of, existing public resource data and information; and
• more timely resource-use decisions resulting in greater certainty for investors.

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Identified benefits to government included an enhanced “business friendly” reputation; streamlined measures that reduce government costs and frustrations; reduced time that regulatory agencies have to spend responding to general enquiries; and economies of scale and scope from clients being assisted by FrontCounter BC staff who are experienced in translating technical information into plain language.

Challenges

The principal challenge will be in developing and maintaining coordination of client-centred service with sponsoring ministries including staff training, supporting information technology and work processes.

Land and Resource Management Planning

Opportunities

The completion and implementation of strategic land and resource management plans continue to be of strong interest to First Nations, industry sectors, businesses and individuals desiring certainty of access to natural resources and/or to protect the environmental values of specific areas. Regional stakeholder planning tables have concluded their work on six strategic-level plans: Lillooet, Central Coast, North Coast, Morice, Sea-to-Sky and Haida Gwaii/Queen Charlotte Islands. All of these plans are at the provincial government-to-First Nation (“government-to-government”) discussion stage. They have not yet been approved for implementation by government.

Government has also directed resources to the review of existing approved strategic land and resource management and regional land use plans as a consequence of Mountain Pine Beetle infestations, requests from First Nations or relating to development of recovery plans for broad-ranging species-at-risk.

Challenges

Desired completion timelines for strategic land and resource management plans are likely to be significantly impacted by advancement of the New Relationship with First Nations. The rate at which existing government-approved plans are reviewed and amended will also be limited by available resources.

Species-at-Risk Coordination

Species-at-risk are a bellwether indicator of the environmental health of the province. Species-at-risk issues also cut across all sectors of the province’s resource economy — forestry, oil and gas, tourism, wildlife harvesting, First Nations relations, international trade — and affect B.C.’s ability to attract and support investment.

Opportunities

To date, provincial efforts to protect, manage and recover species-at-risk have been a response to federal species at risk legislation, advocacy campaigns by some stakeholder groups or an outcome of regional opportunities to address these issues within broader land and resource decision-making processes. Through management tools made available in legislation, such as the Wildlife Act and Forest and Range Practices Act, the province has taken significant steps to implement sustainable wildlife harvesting, mining, tourism and forestry practices that protect species-at-risk. There remains a need, however, for effective cross-government coordination, particularly for a number of broad-ranging species with large Crown land habitats and for which recovery requires coordination of management activities across many government organizations, businesses and industry.

The bureau has been given the opportunity and is accountable for coordinating development of a government-wide, science-based approach to the management and recovery of those broad-ranging species-at-risk (e.g., Mountain Caribou, Marbled Murrelet and Northern Spotted Owl) that are part of the province’s complement of globally significant species. The bureau works very closely with colleagues at the Ministries of Environment and Forests and Range as these agencies have the mandate for implementation of species and habitat recovery tasks and activities.

Challenges

While recovery and management options have been developed and/or endorsed by eminent wildlife biologists and other scientists, some management options being considered for the remaining regional populations of the three species noted above will not meet the expectations of all stakeholders. It is anticipated there will be direct and indirect economic impacts to some industries, such as forestry, that are a direct outcome of some recovery strategies. Further, even with application of the best science, natural resource management and an appropriate level of resources, some populations may not respond to any recovery strategies.

Land and Resource Information

Opportunities

Industry, businesses, individuals and various levels of government need access to relevant, reliable land and resource information and related services to support informed, science based decision-making. They need this access to be seamless, easy-to-understand and timely. The bureau has been given an opportunity and is accountable for expanding and simplifying how natural resource information is made available to clients outside the provincial government.

Government uses a number of information technologies and management (IT/IM) applications that are agency or ministry-specific to manage information concerning applications for natural resource use authorizations (e.g., permits, tenures, licences) and for related compliance and enforcement activities. Finding synergies between these different applications should produce significant efficiency gains.

Challenges

Managing client expectations, setting priorities and coordinating information sources across government within available resources is an ongoing challenge. One major reason is that the bureau is not the “steward” of most the natural resource information held by government.⁹ The bureau’s role is restricted to managing all of the natural resource information after it has been collected and quality assured by other agencies.

A second major reason is that a large number of information technology applications are being used by the bureau and the Corporate Services Division¹⁰ to manage land and resource information. While considerable progress on systems integration has been made over the last four years, integration challenges still exist.

9	Agencies with the natural resource mandate retain this accountability (e.g., the Ministry of Environment manages the collection of fish and wildlife inventory information).
10	The Corporate Services Division supports the bureau, Ministry of Agriculture and Lands, Ministry of Environment and a number of other agencies. Among other functions, it directly supports the bureau information management and dissemination accountabilities.