Wrote Donna Crossland earlier today…
Nova Scotia’s ONLY Crown land maple syrup producer has their Crown lease abruptly discontinued after this maple season by DNR.
These are public forests and unceded Mi’kmaq lands.
Our government is opting for forestry operations or maybe a mine – who knows, since there is no communication or public consultations anymore. Rather than syrup from our sugar maple-dominated forests, they have some other goal.
Yesterday I attended the Hutchinson’s maple tour. The pancake brunch was held at the East Dalhousie Community Hall (my native community), so I couldn’t resist. It was a joyous and fun event up until we learned of their loss of access to sugar maples on Crown land.
Hutchinson’s was the ONLY maple syrup business taking place on public forest lands, though Chris had always rightfully pointed out that there was room for several more maple operations in public forests.
The Hutchonsons have 14 years behind them in maple syrup production, becoming the largest maple syrup producer in NS; it’s sold internationally to many countries as well as at our local grocery.
While Chris and Anna have some sugar maple forest of their own, the largest source of sap for Hutchinson’s maple products will be cut off when their Crown lease expires, with the refusal from NS DNR to renew it.
What will happen to the maple stands now? My guess is that most of the maple will be eventually chipped for biomass – we keep hearing the greenwashed messaging of ‘green energy’ obtained from burning wood and production of renewable jet fuel when it isn’t beneficial at all toward mitigating climate change unless strict caveats are met. Trees are more useful toward mitigating climate change when they can be left standing in the woods, surely a major benefit of maple syrup operations.
Whatever happened to Lahey’s recommendation that Crown wood be used for the highest value products? Has Houston even read the Lahey recommendations? My MLA had most certainly not read the report the last time I checked.
Just a few bottles of Hutchinson’s Maple Syrup – the one with the Nova Scotia Loyal tags – remained on the shelf today at Sobeys in Halifax. Hutchinson’s is clearly a favourite brand.
Pathetic. Idiotic…. Nope! Not even those words suit this latest ill-informed decision.
In the meantime, let’s enjoy maple syrup from our Crown lands while we can.
And a delicious coffee or maple latte purchased from the actual ‘coffee barista’ employed at the Hutchinson’s Lake Paul coffee drive through!