'Universities hurting selves' Donna Redekop snips tree in Nechako public sustained yield unit. Citi/pn photo liy Dine Milne TREES CUT DURING TIMBER SHORTAGE This 'forest' is thinned by hand A few months ago Donna Redekop of Vanderhoof was busy planting trees, secure in the thought that her labors were providing a continued future for B.C.’s forest industry. This week Donna and seven other girls are trudging through the woods cutting down young trees — again to provide a rich resource base for the timber industry. What may be a curious anomaly to Donna and her fellow workers makes perfect sense to the provincial forest service. Ensuring a continued supply of trees in the province requires for more than replanting programs. Part of the job also calls for the careful thinning of timber stands to allow trees to grow lin (1 • j • /I (l/AMl Second front page Prince George - Thursday, August 24, 1978 larger and healthier for the future. This week Donna and her colleagues continue to use hand thinning shears in about 30 hectares of the Nechako public sustained yield unit mid-way between Prince George and Vanderhoof. Al Todd, a member of the forest service’s reforestation division in Prince George, explains there’s really logic to the apparent madness of cutting down trees during talk of timber shortages. The area being snipped has about 7,000 to 9,000 trees to the hectare, meaning trees would normally have a tough time competing for soil nutrients and if left alone, would grow to a less than desirable timber stands. By thinnning out the lesser species of trees — now about five and six years old — about 1,400 to 1,600 trees remain to the hectare ensuring a healthy timber crop and better timber for future lumber needs. Todd says the hand thinning methods being used in the Nechako PSYU are the first time the forest service has tried the technique in the massive Prince George forest district. The district is the second largest in the province next to Prince Rupert, and stretches from Endako in the west to the Alberta border, and from the Yukon border south of Vale-mount. Todd said the girls are working in an area that was “drag-scarified” about six years ago. That means the soil was mechanically churned up to allow new trees to naturally regenerate in a logged-off area. He says manual thinning of a forest not onlv provides for the chance to hire local people but gives workers an opportunity to be more selective about what trees to cut. Trees are snipped every 2.5 metres with only the best being saved. Todd said another 150 hectares could be manually thinned this year and the forest service may have up to 5,000 hectares a year suitable for treatment in the future. More colorful than fall in the Rockies is the pre-election mating dance currently being performed by federal Liberals. Like most attempts at seduction, the overtures are full of bravado, noise and desperation. When it’s over, there’s nothing left but broken promises. In 1974 Trudeau wooed the masses by speaking out against wage and price controls and showing off his new North Vancouver wife. Late wage and price controls appeared and his wife left. Choreography for the Ballet of the Ballot this year includes a clever scene of massive blood-letting where the government symbolizes its sincerity by wildly hacking away at civil service budgets. It doesn’t matter if there’s no logical rationale for the butcher shop scene. Bureaucratic blood is what the public wants and that’s what it’s getting. All this is supposed to convince us the Liberals are a tough-minded, business-oriented lot will to do necessary belt-tightening when the need occurs. What’s really happened is the Liberals, through years of economic floundering and successive bungling, have ended up with no belt to tighten and their pants at ankle level. Headline-grabbing budget cuts are supposed to lift our eyes from the dreary fact of life that we’re being administered by a government which long ago lost the ability to lead. Some of the proposed budget cuts could be comical if they didn’t reek of pathos. Shifting funds from unemployment insurance benefits to job creation programs simply means more people can enter the cycle of working long enough to collect the UIC benefits which no longer will be there in such abundance. Slashing the CBC’s budget is another example of forked-tongue mentality. First Trudeau and the Liberals try and convince us national unity is an urgent priority then they cripple the one major contributor to greater unity and understanding of what’s happening in other parts of the country. ★ * * Amidst all the hatchet wielding, the federal government has been callously mute about the honest reasons for economic sluggishness in this country. There is no honest explanation that the most critical cause of diminishing investment activity here as well as in the U.S. rests with a decline in the rate of profit return. The profits which spur cor- porations to expand and build new facilities have nothing to do with how much the CBC wants to spend in a year or how many self-destruct jobs the government can make with its high profile job creation projects. The decline in profits is linked directly to the rapidly escalating cost of oil which has severely hurt rates of return for corporations. Canada’s industries are machine rather than labor-oriented. It takes gas and oil to run those machines be they logging trucks or steel mills and rising costs of fuel make for less profit and less incentive to spend money on new facilities. It’s a dilemma calling for far-sighted, intelligent planning by government willing to recognize its national economic woes rest on successful adaptation to global trends. Not a government of indiscriminate hatchet men. The have -1- told-you-lately- that-I- love you Weekend Special. No. No, I haven’t, and I should, and I will. I won’t give you a diamond or a mink or a Dior gown.^I’ll give you me. I’ll give you us. I’ll take you for a weekend at the Vancouver Four Seasons Hotel. There will be hundreds of guests and hundreds of people serving us, and we won’t see any of them. We’ll eat, and drink, and dance, and wander around Stanley Park. And we’ll shop together, and swim together, and laugh and talk and relax together. And when we drive home, we’ll sit closer in the car than when we left. Weekend Specials, $35.00 per night,* for both of you. •Minimum 2 nights. FourSeasons Hotel \ANCOUVER 791 West Georgia Street, Vancouver, H.C. V6C 2TI For reservations, call our toll free number: In Canada (800) 268-6282 • In the U.S. (800) 828-1188 VANCOUVER (CPl -Universities that lower their admission standards in order to attract new students are only hurting themselves, Doug Kenny, president of the University of British Columbia said Tuesday. Kenny, addressing delegates to the Commonwealth Universities Congress here, said universities cannot afford to open their doors to everyone because they must maintain high quality. “The hard fact is that, by and large, the essence of education is to be selective,’’ he said. “In accepting this truth, most universities (have) realized that their guiding principle was to enhance quality, while fully recognizing the importance of justice. “Without a strong commitment to first-class learning, a university will be committed to a second-class future.” Kenny said universities should provide equal educational opportunities regardless of race, sex, religion and economic status but, at the same time, must also maintain admission standards. “This principle simply means that we guarantee every person with the appropriate entrance requirements an equal opportunity to enter a university,” he said. “This principle doesn’t imply an open admissions policy— in fact, entrance requirements assume an inequality based on academic and intellectual grounds.” MEN’S FLAG FOOTBALL ■:J-' -•■•'■I ULsm. 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APPROVED • J SINGLE & DOUBLE WIDE Oa 8 new & 24 as new MOBILE HOMES All 1976 Models, Manufactured by Atco & Homco PRICED FOR IMMEDIATE DISPOSAL 20 DOUBLE WIDE HOMES Priced From $ 16,500,„$ 18,500 15-23/x44/ 2-24/x56/ 3-24/x38/ 12 SINGLE WIDE HOMES Priced From 10-12'x64'6" *10,500,0$ 12,500 2-12,x68' All Homes c/w deluxe refrigerator, range, washer & dryer. ALSO: Front & rear cement stairs with wrought iron railing FREE PICTORIAL BROCHURE ON REQUEST For Appointment to View Contact: Mr. Ken Ardiel, Mr. Michael Hunt MAYNARD'S auctioneers ltd. 1233 West Georgia St., Vancouver % (604) 685-7378 (Agents for the Owners) NOTE: THIS IS NOT AN AUCTION