Server: Microsoft-IIS/2.0 Date: Thu, 20 Nov 1997 21:48:12 GMT Content-Type: text/html Accept-Ranges: bytes Last-Modified: Tue, 18 Nov 1997 23:34:53 GMT Content-Length: 28694 Weyerhaeuser

 

Facing the future: sustainability through continuous improvement

Remarks by President John W. Creighton, Jr.
To: Second Global Conference on Paper and the Environment
Frankfurt
26 April 1994

Introduction:

Good Morning. It's a pleasure to be in Frankfurt to discuss the future of this industry. Coincidentally, Weyerhaeuser's roots are here in Germany. Frederick Weyerhaeuser, our founder, was born 160 years ago in Niedersaulheim. When he came to the United States as a young man, he brought with him the hallmarks of his culture: integrity, optimism, hard work and a sense of responsibility. Those traits helped him start a company that has become the world's largest producer of market pulp and softwood lumber. If you include both our U.S. lands and our long-term leaseholdings in Canada, Weyerhaeuser is responsible for forestlands that are together almost the size of Australia.

During the past century, my company has contributed to our industry's success in meeting the global demand for wood and paper products. We've done that by providing a sustainable supply of wood from increasingly productive forests. As we approach the 21st century, we face the challenge of reducing our environmental impact and maintaining healthy, diverse forest ecosystems.

We're ready for that challenge. Like cost reduction and quality improvement, improved environmental performance is a critical element of superior manufacturing. It requires our every resource, including new technology, meaningful measurements and Total Quality management. But it involves more than the technology of growing trees. We must also manage forests for their spiritual, aesthetic and cultural values-as well as ecological and economic values.

This is especially true since what's right for on forest may not be right for all. The world's forests each feature very different geographies, climates, ages, species mixes and potential uses. For instance, one forest classification system divides Canada into 90 distinct forest types in a dozen ecozones. So no single management practice could possibly fit every situation. What's needed is a balance of forest uses and management techniques.

I believe that young forests-like those owned by Weyerhaeuser-can be managed with emphasis on sustainable wood production while remaining sensitive to other forest values. High productivity from such forests helps relieve the pressure on other forestlands, which can then emphasize values like wilderness, old-growth reserves and recreation. The exact balance will vary from forest to forest but, in total, will create productive, sustainable forests that together serve a variety of ecological, social and economic needs.

I believe those healthy, sustainable forests can be attained through three critical steps:

1. Defining a clear vision and values for the future. Achieving healthy, sustainable forests requires a clear view of what that really means. Weyerhaeuser's vision is clarified by a set of environmental values, which I'll tell you more about shortly.
2. Identifying and taking concrete steps toward our vision. We can make our vision a reality through continuous improvement that considers whole ecosystems and diverse perspectives. Success won't come quickly or easily, but we are making measurable progress with meaningful intermediate steps.
3. Tracking and communicating our progress. Increasingly, our success depends both on making measurable environmental progress and on demonstrating and sharing that progress.

I'd like to discuss each of these three steps, with some examples that indicate how Weyerhaeuser has already begun.

First: the need for a clear vision and values.

We must know where we are going. Since our journey impacts the forest resources of future generations, long-term perspectives is important. Fortunately, people in the forest products industry are used to thinking in 50-and 100-year increments fitting the life cycles of trees. We are one of the few industries experienced with truly long-term planning. And Weyerhaeuser already has a template for defining that environmentally sound future: minimum-impact manufacturing. That approach begins with a broad perspective that uses careful planning, tracking and continuous improvement to direct change throughout our operations.

From that perspective, what does our vision of "healthy, sustainable forests" mean? At Weyerhaeuser, its meaning is created by our stewardship values. We've committed to managing our forest for wood production, and also to protecting or enhancing:

  • soil productivity.
  • water quality.
  • fish and wildlife habitat.
  • biologically or culturally unique areas, and
  • plant and animal species diversity.

I could discuss each at length, but for now I'll just talk about one. Our commitment to fish habitat means:

  • creating buffers along rivers and wetlands;
  • leaving downed trees in the water to create riffles, pools and hiding places;
  • maintaining the light and temperature levels fish-and their food sources-prefer;
  • preventing siltation through better road building and maintenance; and
  • taking part in cooperative research and policy making to improve our understanding of fish habitats and human impacts upon it.

In addition, though we manage our company's private forestlands to produce wood, our vision for sustainable forestry also says that we cooperate with public agencies and resource groups to help them manage public forestlands for other purposes. Those may include wilderness, old-growth reserves, protection of threatened or endangered species, or other forest values.

One example is my company's participation in Canada's model forest program. Diverse partners have united to ensure sustainable ecological, social and economic benefits from 10 model forests across the country. The Prince Albert model forest in Saskatchewan, for example, is 315,000 hectares jointly managed by representatives of:

  • several First Nations,
  • provincial and national government,
  • the Canadian Institute of Forestry, as well as
  • Weyerhaeuser Canada.

This cooperative project is helping us all learn more about maintaining healthy forest ecosystems that can deliver a variety of sustainable benefits.

Other forest users are also key to another Weyerhaeuser value: our pledge to actively listen and respond to public expectations and to communicate consistently. That's important, because both our vision and how we achieve it must withstand scrutiny from the various perspectives of our:

  • scientists,
  • shareholders,
  • customers,
  • communities, and
  • critics.

These diverse audiences force us to ask continuously, "Are we doing enough?" That's why our values include continuously improving the environmental quality and economic value of our forests. Both contribute to the environmentally sound vision and values I just described.

Having a vision and values is not enough, however. We must have action.

That brings us to the second stage of our journey: identifying concrete steps that take us where we want to go.

Before discussing what that means for forestry, let me give an example from our pulp mills that may be familiar. Weyerhaeuser's vision for minimum-impact manufacturing includes eliminating effluents. We've mapped a path for achieving that, but we can't get there all at once. Intermediate steps require reducing the toxicity of our current effluents. This, elemental chlorine-free pulp bleaching, or ECF, moves us in the right direction because it reduces the formation of toxic chlorinated organics. Totally chlorine-free bleaching, or TFC, is another stepping stone. Neither ECF nor TCF is the goal itself. Our vision guides us in identifying and choosing between these intermediates steps.

For forestry, identifying intermediate steps depends on finding or developing ways to measure our progress. Such measurements help determine whether we are, in fact, moving toward our goals. They also provide needed ecological and economic criteria for assessing our options.

Over the years we've developed good measurement criteria for the growth rates and biological needs of our trees. We also have many solid measures of forest soil, water flows, fish habitat and wildlife. We've only just begun collecting data on bio-diversity, aesthetics, or cumulative human impact on a forest ecosystem. Over time, that emerging knowledge will both direct our actions and help quantify improvement. Today, however, those critical measurements and guidelines are still a challenge for some issues.

Take clearcutting, for example. "Clearcutting" is the common name for even-aged management-removing most or all of the trees in an area to make full use of their wood and to prepare the site for replanting. Changes in Weyerhaeuser harvest planning in recent years have generally resulted in:

  • reduced clearcut size,
  • boundaries matched to the landscape,
  • greater consideration of adjacent areas,
  • decreased erosion, and
  • wider buffers for waterways and public roads.

So our clearcutting practices are already being modified to respond to today's ecological understanding.

Before we can determine how clearcutting will evolve in the future, we must fully consider the ecological and economic--as well as aesthetic--tradeoffs.We use even-aged management for sound silvicultural and practical reasons. Some tree species just can't grow to their full potential in less than the full sunlight that follows a clearcut harvest or a wildfire.

Or a volcanic explosion like the one that occurred at Mount St. Helens in Washington state in 1980. Sixty thousand hectares of forestland were flattened, scorched and covered with ash. The destruction far outweighed the impact of even the largest clearcuts, and some experts predicted that the area would take decades, even centuries to recover.

Today, after less than 15 years, trees we planted on Weyerhaeuser land after the eruption stand 10 meters high. Elk have returned by the hundreds. Salmon reproduction rates equal or surpass those on adjoining property. Where nature was unassisted, the area still largely looks like a blast zone. But on managed Weyerhaeuser land, the new forest thrives. The Mount St. Helens eruption gave us an unprecedented laboratory to test our forests' recuperative powers.

In examining clearcutting, shall we disregard that experience and the science on which we base our practices? If so, what should we base actions on? Our foresters and public policy makers must jointly answer these questions, using valid criteria to determine where clearcutting is or is not appropriate. Similar criteria are needed to determine how much old growth is sufficient, when a wildlife population is viable, or how biodiversity is defined.

I'm hopeful that the process and criteria for making such decisions may evolve from work by groups such as the International Standards Organization. Weyerhaeuser is also working this issue through the Canadian Pulp & Paper Association and the American Forest & Paper Association.

Until better processes and criteria are developed, however, we must proceed-using the best information at hand-to make meaningful and measurable improvements toward our vision. At Weyerhaeuser, for instance, regional forest councils set objectives for the soil, water, fish and wildlife habitat, aesthetics and biodiversity of our forests. These objectives are based both on broad goals, such as protecting wetlands or other special biotopes, and on more specific priorities addressing individual species and community issues. Our forest councils then define changes in our practices to achieve those objectives.

For example, we're taking fish and wildlife habitat management a big step further by developing our first multispecies habitat plan for 40,000 hectares of our forestland in southwest Washington state.

Last year, we voluntarily initiated the first phase of this approach, known as watershed analysis. The trial took place on 26,000 hectares in another part of Washington-the Tolt River watershed. It was a cooperative effort by landowners, government agencies, native people and environmental groups, each recognizing the importance of protecting water quality. As pressures on the earth's fresh-water resources mount, better management of all forested watersheds becomes essential. Further, we must concern ourselves with not only individual impacts on watersheds, but with the cumulative effects of all human activities.

To understand those cumulative effects, a team of scientists thoroughly studied the Tolt watershed's slopes and soils, water flows, erosion potential and fish habitat. The team then defined special management prescriptions tailored to the unique conditions in each area. These prescriptions-such as increasing the riparian buffer zones along certain streams-are in addition to the normal forest practice rules.

We've begun implementing these prescriptions and monitoring to test their effectiveness. That makes this a dynamic, adaptive process that will change with our understanding. In the next phase, satellite images and on-site surveys will help us address wildlife and biodiversity. By December 1994, Weyerhaeuser scientists will have analyzed 10 to 12 additional watersheds, with a goal of completing five more each year.

Another example addresses scenic beauty, which is especially important in my home state. We asked the public about harvest aesthetics, and consulted a well-known landscape architecture firm to identify ways to better manage them. Then we began training our foresters to consider those perspectives when planning future harvests.
Over time, we expect efforts like these to result in what my Swedish colleagues call a "richer" forest.

That brings me to the third step in achieving our vision: Tracking and communicating our progress.

The information we obtain in the previous step will be invaluable for assuring both ourselves and the public that we are, in fact, making steady progress. This industry has a shaky record in either announcing successes or admitting difficulties. We must overcome that tendency, and explain what we are doing and why.

We've done a good job of that in terms of trees. I can tell you, for instance, that Weyerhaeuser planted over 40 million seedlings last year, or that we harvest no more than 2 to 3 percent of our forests each year, thus ensuring a sustainable supply. I can also tell you that over 400 species of animals, birds and fish live in our western U.S. forests-but I can't yet say how that count may change over time, or whether it implies appropriate biodiversity. We still must develop consistent, meaningful methods for tracking and communicating the improvements we make.

We also realize we must speak a language our audiences can understand. As scientists and business people, our habit has been to communicate primarily with facts, figures and technical terms. Rarely have those been well understood or well received. Our various audiences are often more interested in the spiritual, cultural and aesthetic values of forests than in growth rates. We must better consider those values.

Nor do our individual customers and communities represent the only opportunities for improved communication. The task before us is far larger than a single company or country. As an industry, we must support joint research. Share our environmental discoveries. And learn from others' successes and mistakes.

Finally, we must recognize that our vision will evolve in response to new discoveries, changed values or breakthrough technology. Our challenge is to accept that uncertainty and strive for our vision in a continuous improvement cycle.

Conclusion

To summarize, the parts of that cycle again are:

  • first, defining a clear vision and values for the future;
  • second, identifying and taking concrete steps to achieve that vision; and
  • third, tracking and communicating our progress.

Together, these three steps guide improvement based on specific scientific knowledge while ensuring decisions that fit a holistic view of our forest ecosystems and the broad perspective of our long-term goals.

This is not, by the way, "business as usual." We have examined our forest practices in response to public concern and are making needed changes. I'm convinced that the three-step approach I've described will result in significant, measurable improvement. It has already allowed companies worldwide to make significant improvements toward superior manufacturing. If you'd like to stop by the Weyerhaeuser exhibit in the conference display area, we'd be happy to tell you more about the environmental improvements our company is already making with this approach.

In closing, I'd like to leave you with this thought: However our environmental vision takes shape in the coming years, and however our industry may change, we know today that we have a long way to go. The complexity of our multiple geographies, habitats, ownerships, publics and political environments ensures that. But with a vision firmly in place, and with a commitment to measurable action and continuous improvement, together we can reach that future.

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