The epic failure of our forest industry

[Hurtlander]

BC is exporting just as much lumber as it always have. Just doing it with automated mills that don't have as many employees. It is the same scenario in a different field of endeavor as the auto industry - jobs there have disappeared in large numbers, but more cars are being manufactured.
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BC is not exporting the same volume of lumber it always has. Despite most mills now being heavily automated, they are not even close to making up the difference from the approximately 50 mills that have permanently closed. And why did these mills close ? Because of a shrinking timber supply and a smaller ALC...It would be quite a trick to produce the same volume of lumber now as before without actually having the same volume of timber available.

And you're right with the car analogy, more cars are being manufactured.....in Mexico, Korea, China, India, ..

[ferri]

*Don't start making it personal! Thank you.

[hobbyguy]

Actually Hurtlander, I looked up the figures. During the 1990s under the NDP exported 20,000,000 lumber per year, last year? 19,478,264 .... pretty darn close. http://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/data/statistics/business-industry-trade/trade/trade-data - just click on softwood lumber exports xls and you will have all the numbers. It just takes an awful lot fewer mills and people to produce that lumber.

[BeingHuman]

Yet again, another expert source decries the wild, wild, west approach to resource extraction in BC, the cumulative impacts of which are largely unknown and unmanaged.

When Forest Practices Board auditors visited a cutblock near Chetwynd to check on seedlings replanted by logging company Canfor, instead of a healthy young forest, they found a gravel pit. A mining company was operating the gravel pit. And the seedlings, of course, were gone.

The board auditors found everything from wind farms, mines, and natural gas wells, to pipelines, power lines and mineral exploration. Roads de-activated by the forest company had been re-activated in an improvised manner to explore for coal. Drill sites had been built on existing cutblocks, permanently removing the forest cover.

It’s a problem that is occurring time after time on forest land throughout the province as global demand grows for B.C. resources and the province issues more and more resource development permits on lands that used to be dedicated primarily to forestry.

And there is no way of telling if the land can sustain all of these new uses, the board warns. Throughout B.C., there are 250,000 active permits authorizing activity on the land. “Yet their cumulative impacts remain UNKOWN and UNMANAGED, the board warns.”

http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Re ... story.html

[Hurtlander]

Actually Hurtlander, I looked up the figures. During the 1990s under the NDP exported 20,000,000 lumber per year, last year? 19,478,264 .... pretty darn close. http://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/data/statistics/business-industry-trade/trade/trade-data - just click on softwood lumber exports xls and you will have all the numbers. It just takes an awful lot fewer mills and people to produce that lumber.

You're reading it wrong, look again.

[hobbyguy]

Nope. The numbers are as I posted. I look at volume, not $ as prices fluctuate.

[Urban Cowboy]

*removed*

[BeingHuman]

It seems the Christy Clark Government is looking the other way when it comes to logging violations in our province. The Forests Practices Board, a government-funded logging watchdog, recently completed an investigation into Teal Cedar Products, a Surrey-based logging company that was logging along mountain sides near the shores of Skidegate Channel in Haida Gwaii.

The board found that there were clear logging violations, and that the Ministry of Forests had been aware of the suspect operations, but chose not to come down on the loggers. And as other reports suggest, this isn't the only time the provincial government has let these types of logging violations slide.

Every time a logging companies applies for a licence to cut, they must include a visual impact assessment that shows exactly how their operations will alter the landscape. In particularly scenic areas, cuts usually have to be less than noticeable to help encourage tourism and recreation.

But in many cases, that's not what's happening, according to a 2013 evaluation, 39 per cent of the province's logging operations failed to meet their visual objectives. You can read more about this important issue in the following link:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-c ... -1.3788314

[Mr_Mrs_Wolf]

If you support Christy Clark BC Liberals, then there is no denying you support these such actions.

A U.S. Lumber Baron leading attack on B.C. forestry jobs helped pay Christy Clark’s second salary

While grandstanding on the campaign trail, Christy Clark lashed out at “greedy” US Lumber Barons threatening BC jobs.

But those same US lumber barons are funding her campaign and helped pay her $300,000 second salary.

Christy Clark’s BC Liberals have taken $241,000 in donations from Weyerhaeuser - the single largest softwood lumber producer in the United States.

Weyerhaeuser has not only shuttered or sold 10 BC mills over the past 16 years, but their US parent company has been leading the fight to impose unfair duties on Canadian softwood lumber that will kill BC forestry jobs.

As part of an American lobbying coalition, Weyerhaeuser launched two petitions calling for new job-killing duties in November 2016, but Christy Clark kept right on cashing their cheques - taking another $10,000 while Weyerhaeuser lobbied to crush BC forest workers. The most recent contribution came on March 25th, 2017.

The BC Liberals have taken more than $2 million in donations from three companies that rank in the top five US producers of softwood lumber. Under the BC Liberals’ watch, these three companies have shut 18 BC mills and put thousands of British Columbians out of work while opening dozens of mills in the United States.

The BC Liberals have taken more than $5.5 million from forestry companies while BC lost 30,000 forest jobs under their watch.

Unlike Brad Wall and Rachel Notley, Clark has not visited Washington to meet with the Trump administration to stand up for Canadian products. Instead, she waited until mid-February before appointing unelected envoy David Emerson.

This leads to two questions for Christy Clark:

How can British Columbians trust you on softwood when the lumber barons fighting to kill BC jobs helped pay your second salary?
Why haven’t you been to Washington to stand up for BC’s products like the premiers of other natural resource dependent provinces?

[lasnomadas]

She doesn't have time to go to Washington to defend our lumber industry. She's too busy boring us with her BC Liberal talking points and trying to make the NDP 'the bad guy' , as usual.

Actually, she would be the perfect person to send down there to negotiate with Trump. She speaks his language, shes a real ball-breaker, and she'll be needing something to spend her time on after she loses her seat in Kelowna West on May 9.

[George+]

Yes.

It is amazing to see he constantly refering to her repetitive talking points book.
And still stumbling around!
Horgan wants to debate issues based on facts,
Clark wants to make up facts.
Let's have a real issues debate...pls.

[Urban Cowboy]

She's too busy boring us with her BC Liberal talking points and trying to make the NDP 'the bad guy' , as usual.

Actually, she would be the perfect person to send down there to negotiate with Trump. She speaks his language, shes a real ball-breaker, and she'll be needing something to spend her time on after she loses her seat in Kelowna West on May 9.

Oh believe me there's no need for anyone to try and make the NDP the bad guy. They do a splendid job all on their own.

As for the last part, now I really hope the liberals win, just to watch you eat crow.

I'm not nearly so presumptuous as to consider her losing a done deal.

I would have expected last election to have taught you and your fan club a lesson. Apparently not.

[George+]

It all depends on vote splitting.

Vote Greens and get Clark, again.

[Urban Cowboy]

So in essence once the ballots are counted we'll know.

[hobbyguy]

The Green Party has a good leader, and is a respectable and honest party. Far superior to the NDP.

But that has nothing to do with the topic of this thread.

There has been no "epic failure" of our forest industry. There has, however, been an epic failure of markets for pulp and paper.

http://www.denverpost.com/2012/11/30/paper-industry-shrinks-as-demand-thins/

"The North American paper industry is in rapid decline. Mills have let go thousands of workers and are competing for a shrinking market. A mill in Sartell, Minn., that closed this year after a Memorial Day explosion was the latest to go dark."

"Companies have closed 117 American mills since 2000, according to the Center for Paper Business and Industry Studies at Georgia Tech University. About 223,000 industry jobs have gone away in that time."

"Kindles and iPads, e-mail, PDFs, the decline of first-class mail, and waning newspaper and magazine circulations are all to blame. Analysts predict demand will fall at least another 18 percent by 2024."

The context of the forest industry is then much more narrow. Lumber production is now being dominated by "super mills" that mean the old small mills just can not compete. It is not just in BC that older small mills are being closed. Sweden and the US are seeing similar trends, the older less technology driven and high labor content mills just can't cut it. The mills get better yield per log and have dramatically lower labor costs.

From 2005 to 2012 the US sawmilling industry lost over 1,000 sawmills and 300,000 jobs. Yet overall output remains solid, if down. There is little chance those jobs will return. Logging in the US has rebounded, but the sawmill jobs picture remains poor.

In that context, it is disingenuous to make a political argument about the forest industry. Yes, this thing or that thing might be a controversial issue, but overall the industry trends are to fewer jobs for the same output in lumber, and fewer jobs and lower output in pulp and paper.