RESIDENT'S MESSAGE

Federal government
should help industry

by Dave Haggard

ur union has known for years that
the world is changing and that
Canada’s forest industry has to con-
tinually adapt to keep up with those
changes. When lumber markets in
Japan collapsed over two years ago
the effects were devastating for our members.

Companies on the B.C. Coast that put all of
their eggs in one basket took major hits and, as
a result, so did our membership. The effects of
that are being felt to this very day.

Lumber prices in the U.S. dropped as Ameri-
can wood that normally would go to Japan
flooded the American market. Restrictions
against Canadian lumber exports to the U.S.
under the Canada - U.S. Softwood Lumber
Agreement limited the amount that some of our
members’ mills can export south of the line.

That and other influences such as high wood
costs, attacks on our industry by radical, boy-
cotting environmental groups are among the
factors that have made the economic recovery of
the industry very tough.

The industry is slowly recovering now and
most of our members are heading back to work.

But for many, 1999 could be another unstable
year.

We could easily continue to play the blame
game. While that may make us feel better, it

won't solve our prob-
lems down the road.

I have gotten
pretty tired of going
to meetings where
everybody would
stare at their feet
and blame the rest
of the world for their
troubles. So we have
decided to do some-
thing tea

Why not work on
a national strategy
to market Canadian
forest products? If
we can work together
with the industry
and governments to
develop and expand
our international
exports, increase the
number of products
we produce, proiees
existing markets and gain access to new ones,
then our membership and communities will
benefit. :

In January we released a paper entitled Mar-
keting Canada’s Forest Products and requested
assistance from the federal government to
make this happen. In mid-May we made a pre-
sentation to the Parliamentary Standing Com-
mittee on Natural Resources (see page thirteen)
to repeat our request for federal assistance to
make a marketing strategy a reality.

We think the federal government should
knuckle up some resources to assist an industry
which is crucial to Canada. The forest industry
is this country’s number one single largest
employer of Canadians. About 300,000 Canadi-
ans are directly employed in it and it is also the
largest source of exports earning that this coun-

try has, contribu’

net $31.8 billion t
Canada’s balance of pay-
ments in 1997.

We have met with
company CEO’s and gov-
ernment officials who
have agreed with us in
principle that there
should be market analy-
sis done to examine
what marketing is work-
ing and find new mar-
ket opportunities. We
have to look at problems
like capital formation
and other domestic hur-
dles to development and
marketing.

We also have to exam-
ine and come up with
plans to overcome out-
side factors like protec-
tionism, countervail
threats, and biological concerns that customers
have, such as the gypsy moth and pine nema-
todes.

We also have to look at countering the effects
of green extremist groups and examine the role
of international certifying agencies which can
serve as non-tariff barriers to trade.

In short, there’s a whole bunch of things that

we think we can do in cooperation with govern-
ment and industry to promote Canadian forest
products. We think that the federal government
should take action and put forth the resources
necessary to undertake such an effort.
Forest industry workers normally go about
their work and don’t ask for much. Now we
have asked for help and we hope the federal
government will deliver.

Times are changing
in forest industry

by Kim Pollock

[9D he wood industry is going through

ee] | some interesting twists and turns

these days. In Saskatchewan, the

| provincial government has announ-

| ced a major expansion of the forest

sector. This is good news for work-

ers, who stand to gain thousands of jobs and to

I.W.A. Local 1-184, which is determined to sign
them all up.

As I suggested after a visit to Saskatchewan
last summer, there is huge potential for growth
because Saskatchewan has huge reserves of
timber that few in that agriculturally-obsessed
province even know about. Until now, much
that timber was tied up in Weyerhaueser’s
huge forest management area on the province’s
northwest side and Saskfor MacMillan on the
east side. Weyerhaueser and Saskfor MacMil-
lan will both be part of the expansion of the
wood industry: notably Weyerhaueser's joint
venture Wapaweeka mill in Prince Albert and
Saskfor MacMillan’s announced plans to pro-
ceed with a new OSB mill at Hudson Bay.

The New Democratic Party government is
also going to carve into Weyerhaueser’s huge
domain to allow several joint ventures between
companies, communities and First Nations.

In Ontario, the provincial government has
cut a deal with green groups and industry to
put in place new parks and protected areas in
its Lands for Life program. The Harris govern-
ment’s plan will create some 2.3 million hectares
of new parks, park additions or reclassifica-
tions. Although there were new parks for urban-
based preservationists and compensation for
forest companies, the needs of workers and
communities have been ignored.

In British Columbia, which was rocked by the
decline of the Japanese economy and the shock
waves that sent through North American lum-
ber markets, things are picking up. New invest-
ments have been announced by companies
including Louisiana Pacific and Riverside in
the Interior, while the Coast is picking up in
many places as Japan gradually rebounds.

All of these hopeful signs for our industry will
be affected in one way or another by market

Already, there is con-
siderable skirmishing
around the the Canada -
U.S. Softwood Lumber
Agreement and other
U.S.-led trade actions.
Last year the U.S reclas-

developments and forest certification processes.

sified pre-drilled studs
to fall under the agree-
ment and therefore sub-

ject to quotas. In spite of
a dissenting opinion from.
the World Customs
Organization in May, the
Americans _ recently
moved against two more value-added products;
rougher-header fascia and notched lumber.
Canada’s federal government has appealed the
ruling on studs and has indicated it will fight on
the other two items. These struggles indicate

there are many more battles ahead.
Second, there are a

Forest Process that could eventually embrace
all of the forests from northern British Colum-
bia through to northern Quebec. That process is
starting out with an Ontario-based pilot project
that is being done by the World Wildlife Fund.
A Great Lakes-St.Lawrence process has been
negotiated but not approved by FSC Interna-
tional.

L.W.A. President Dave Haggard plans to seek
national board approval for membership of FSC
this month. I’m sure our membership in the
FSC would be no picnic. But as Haggard said
following our attendance last year at a forest
certification conference hosted by the Interna-
tional Federation of Building and Woodworkers
in Bonn, Germany, we are better inside the tent
than outside throwing rocks in.

The FSC should remember that it is on the
stick, too. As long as it has concluded regional
standards that a broad range of industry,
worker representatives, communities, indige-
nous peoples and

number of new develop-
ments on the forest cer-
tification scene. The
Canadian Standards
Association Sustainable
Forestry Initiative is
slowly moving forward,
with MacMillan Bloedel
set to announce comple-
tion of the process on
some of its Vancouver
Island lands. This is an
important step for CSA,

Only time will tell whether
the Forest Stewardship
Council will stay on the
extremist margins with

groups like Greenpeace or

move to the middle.

greens can live with
in, say, Sweden, Bri-
tain or Germany,
which are currently in
progrestt There is no
good reason that any
of the Canadian re-
gional standards
should be out of line
with those ones.
Secondly, a little his-
tory: prior to comple-
tion of the Swedish

which the I.W.A has sup-
ported since its mid-90’s inception. However, we
don’t know what kind of clout the CSA process
will have internationally.

The Forest Stewardship Council is also mov-
ing forward. A certification has been completed
is some of the Irving Corporation’s New

Brunswick operations. Finalization of the| A

process depends, however, on an appeal of the
certification by the Sierra Club of Canada.

The FSC has also completed a draft regional
standard for British Columbia. That standard is
far from acceptable to industry and the I.W.A.,
though. The B.C. FSC steering committee has
until recently been the complete captive of
green groups such as Sierra and Greenpeace.
With the addition of new, more moderate mem-
bers and staff, it remains to be seen whether
FSC can cut to the chase and draw up as rea-
sonable a standard for B.C. as those already
agreed to in Sweden and Great Britain. A round-
table process of industry, labour, community
and green stakeholders will likely begin this
summer.

The FSC is also planning to convene a Boreal

FSC regional standard
the FSC was under the gun from members of
the British buyers’ association, Group of 95-
plus.

That group effectively told FSC to put up or

shut up: provide us with some reasonably-
priced, mass-produced product soon or forget it.
deal was quickly hatched in Sweden.
Now, the same pressure is coming from North
America, in the form of the Certified Forest
Products Council, which includes Home Depot.
The FSC is again under strong pressure to gen-
erate some product that is acceptable.

All of this says that, as I noted before, it
won't be easy to cut deals with the greens who
still dominate FSC. But there is also an oppor-
tunity. The FSC itself is at a crossroads that
the moderates within know all too well. Only
time will tell whether they want to stay on the
extremist margins with groups like Greenpeace

or move to the middle, where you need to com-
promise.

Kim Pollock is the Director of Envi ;
Public Policy for I.W.A. CANA BR irorerera as

4/LUMBERWORKER/JUNE, 1999