The so-called “black liquor tax incentive”, which is code for subsidy, has recently blown up in the face of Washington DC lawmakers.

Notwithstanding the unenviable track record on bailouts recorded by the US thus far and the egregious nature of this tax subsidy (it is the equivalent of economic suicide), various politicians are mounting a strong opposition to any thought of cancellation.

Canadian lumber exporters who have been on the receiving end of numerous US subsidy allegations for 30 years are all too familiar with the two faces of American protectionism.  One face expresses high indignation if foreign goods are viewed as being subsidized.  The other face is a shameless supporter of domestic US subsidies.

Another aspect of this two sided face is starting to emerge from the shadows of protectionism.  Simply put, I believe that some time ago the Obama administration decided to kill two birds with one stone and advance a climate change agenda to promote not only a greener economy but to provide a measure of protection for US producers against those countries with a less then stellar track record on GHG emissions.

This possibility represents a huge risk to Canada.  Stay tuned.

John Allan

Generating More Value from Our Forests, a vision and action plan for further manufacturing, will help position British Columbia as a world leader in innovative and higher-value uses for wood, according to Forests and Range Minister Pat Bell.

“We have a tremendous opportunity to strengthen our pulp, softwood and further manufacturing sectors and create new high-value products for the changing global economy,” said Bell. “By 2020, I believe our forest sector could generate more economic value per hectare of forest-land than any other jurisdiction in the world.”

The plan provides a framework to mobilize industry stakeholders, investors, researchers, governments and communities around generating more value from wood and wood residue through furthering manufacturing. The aim is to increase production capacity for value-added products and build new capacity for next-generation forest products, such as bio-energy and bio-chemicals.

“The intent of the plan is to bring people together and focus their efforts on adding value to B.C. forest products,” said BC Wood chair Grant McKinnon. “We have all the pieces of the puzzle – skilled workers, primary manufacturing infrastructure, entrepreneurial value-added sector, talented researchers and world-class forests. Now it’s just a matter of putting all the pieces in place to build an industry that sustains jobs and communities by fully utilizing our forests.”

The plan will be supported by the establishment of a Wood Enterprise Centre and a Value for Wood Secretariat. The Wood Enterprise Centre will leverage expertise and resources from existing organizations, research, and academic institutions to expand the use of wood in commercial and institutional construction, facilitate technology transfer, promote training, and expand markets for further-manufactured products.

The Value for Wood Secretariat will provide stakeholders with one-window access to government agencies, leverage public investment, and encourage strategic alliances among businesses, investors and other partners. 

Complete copies of Generating More Value from Our Forests: A Vision and Action Plan for Further Manufacturing are available on the ministry’s website at www.for.gov.bc.ca/het/valueadded.

COFI members, Board and staff had the opportunity to thank Ron Neil for his many years of service to COFI at the Annual General Meeting on April 15, 2009.   In recent years Ron represented Mitsui Homes but his tenure on the Board extends back to the 1980’s and he represented a number of companies over that time.  Ron’s contributions, enthusiasm and commitment to COFI and the BC forest industry over this extended period are remarkable and well appreciated.   Recently his work as Chair of the Finance Committee helped COFI manage and adapt to changing industry circumstances.

We will miss Ron, both his friendly and gentlemanly style and his extensive knowledge of the industry.   We wish Ron, his wife Joan, many years of happiness while bicycling, travelling and enjoying their grandchildren. 

A partnership between the Province and the University of B.C. is enabling one of the world’s top wood scientists to develop cutting-edge manufacturing technology that will help B.C.’s forest products industry compete in the global economy.

Philip Evans has been named the B.C. Leadership Chair in Advanced Forest Products Manufacturing Technology. Before coming to UBC in 2001, he was director of the Centre for Science and Engineering of Materials at the Australian National University in Canberra.

Evans’s research focuses on the structure and properties of wood at the macroscopic, microscopic and nanoscopic levels. He works with universities and corporations around the world on novel technologies for modifying and improving the properties of wood, as well as with B.C. communities that have relied on mills and are diversifying their economies. He was director of UBC’s Centre for Advanced Wood Processing – the world’s largest university-based centre for R&D and education related to value-added wood processing – from 2001 to 2006.

Evans’s accomplishments include developing image software that can pick out cracks in timber and distinguish them from similar markings – such as annual growth rings – saving researchers the time-consuming job of counting the cracks by hand. This, along with a machine he developed to speed up cracking, is accelerating the process of finding treatments to prevent wood from weathering. He is also conducting groundbreaking research into new materials that mimic key structural elements found in wood.

“A better understanding of wood will help us to unlock the hidden potentials of this important natural resource to B.C. and the world,” said Evans. “It also provides us with new opportunities to maximize the economic benefits while protecting our environment.”

For more information go to the UBC Faculty of Forestry website: 
www.forestry.ubc.ca.

British Columbia is developing a new framework to guide silviculture investments and make British Columbia a world leader in growing trees, Forests and Range Minister Pat Bell has announced.

“British Columbia is already a world leader in reforestation – but there is far more to silviculture than planting trees,” said Bell. “Whether it’s the growing market for carbon offsets or next generation forest products, there are significant opportunities that will drive a broader range of silviculture activities. We want to make sure British Columbia’s silviculture framework encourages new investments to maximize the economic, social, and environmental benefits from our forest lands.”

The discussion paper, Growing Opportunities: A New Vision for Silviculture in British Columbia, outlines current silviculture successes, opportunities for improvement, principles to guide how the new vision might be implemented, and some questions to stimulate discussion on the future of silviculture in British Columbia.

The paper sets a new vision for silviculture: “British Columbia’s silviculture policies encourage investments that maximize productivity, value, and support forest resilience.”
Currently, most silviculture activities in British Columbia are driven by the requirement to reforest harvested areas to a “free-growing” state. The goal is to build on this success at reforestation and expand silviculture’s focus and resulting benefits throughout the broader life cycle of forest stands.

“Our silviculture framework must continue to deliver sustainable forest management while providing the flexibility necessary to face climate change, address the timber supply impacts of the mountain pine beetle epidemic, and produce forests that are suitable for new product and carbon sequestration opportunities,” said Bell. “By consulting broadly with forest sector stakeholders, I’m confident our new framework will make British Columbia a world leader in growing trees.”
Comments on the discussion paper will be accepted until Sept. 30, 2009 and recommendations will be developed in fall 2009.

The discussion paper can be accessed at: www.for.gov.bc.ca/hfp/silviculture/discussion_paper/.

The Forest Capital program, established in 1988, provides an important opportunity to celebrate the economic, cultural, natural and historic contributions forests make to community life and the health of the province. Our forests are important to every community in BC. It's a heritage we take pride in and celebrate.
Communities named the Forest Capital host a full year of forest-themed events such as art competitions, interpretive forest walks and logger sports shows. Every community in BC is eligible to be nominated.

The Association of BC Forest Professionals will evaluate nominations based on the communities relationship to its surrounding forests and the strength of the bid proposal.

Nominations are accepted from May to mid-November 2009.

For more information go to the website: 
www.abcfp.ca/about_us/affiliated_programs/forest_capital_of_bc.asp.

New Portal Helps Consumers and Businesses Tackle Climate Change

As the world continues to tackle climate change, a new web portal launched by the Canadian Forest Industry Sustainable Building Coalition helps consumers and businesses understand how they can make a difference by choosing wood products that are harvested from well managed, sustainable forests. The easy-to-navigate portal at www.planetfriendlycanada.com  explains the benefits of building with wood by providing the most up-to-date and accurate information all in one place.

“Canada’s wood products are an excellent environmental choice for construction, but it’s important that consumers and builders have a place to go to find the information they need to help them make a responsible choice when they’re purchasing wood products,” says Peter Moonen of the Sustainable Building Coalition, the group of Canadian forest industry partners who launched the portal. “This portal is the one-stop shop.”

The portal will help promote Canada’s forests because they are known to deliver diverse, high-quality products, backed by some of the toughest environmental laws on earth. Canada’s well managed forests remove carbon from the atmosphere and at the same time provide products that meet society’s needs for timber, fibre and energy.  More and more builders and designers are turning to wood as a natural and renewable product they can use to help lessen the environmental footprint. All of these principles are becoming increasingly important as consumers and builders around the world embrace the importance of tackling climate change with the use of environmentally responsible products.
Through the portal, users can download the latest publications and PowerPoint presentations showing wood’s green attributes, find key Canadian statistics in an easy-to-use format, and view videos from across North America and around the world which demonstrate that using sustainably harvested wood products help fight climate change.

The Planet Friendly Canada portal is sponsored by the Canadian Forest Sustainable Building Coalition, a consortium of partners committed to sustainability and delivering the most accurate and thorough information available on wood and forests.

The Pacific Carbon Trust has released a request for information to develop forest-based carbon offsets, marking the first major step toward positioning B.C. forests as a key supplier in the global carbon market, Forests and Range Minister Pat Bell has announced.

“British Columbia is already world-renowned for reforestation. Now we have an opportunity to increase the amount of carbon our forests sequester, and harness the economic potential of carbon offsets,” said Bell. “This will not only strengthen the forest sector and the communities that depend on it, it will remove more greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and help meet our climate change goals.”

The request for information will gauge interest in projects based on three types of silviculture investments: creating more forests through afforestation, planting seedlings grown from superior seeds, and fertilizing. The goal is to increase the number of trees and improve their volumes and growth rates to make them more efficient at sequestering carbon.

Projects can be located on privately owned land – including property held by local governments and First Nations – as well as Crown land managed under area-based tenures, such as tree farm licences, woodlots and community forests. A request for qualifications and proposals will follow later this year.

The Trust chose afforestation, use of superior seeds and fertilization for its first round of offset procurements because the results are more easily measured and verified. Additional forest-based projects are expected as more methods for quantifying carbon sequestration are developed.
“This is about the climate and the economy. We have an opportunity to develop innovative carbon-offset projects that will create jobs and generate revenue while being mindful of our planet’s health,” said Finance Minister Colin Hansen. “Through innovation, I believe we’ll meet our overall goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 33 per cent by 2020.”

The Pacific Carbon Trust is a Crown corporation established under the British Columbia Climate Action Plan. Its mandate is to deliver quality B.C.-based greenhouse gas offsets to help clients meet their carbon reduction goals.

The BC Festival of Forestry is a non-profit organization committed to providing quality professional development experiences for school teachers.

They run tours twice a year taking 20 Lower Mainland and Victoria area teachers to rural communities in BC.  The tours provide an interactive learning experience to enhance teachers’ understanding of the complexities of sustainable forest management issues, and methods to integrate information into their classes. 

Teachers have the opportunity to immerse themselves in a resource-based community and interact with the people most connected to resource issues.  Tours include hikes in various forest ecosystems, visits to active forest management areas, protected areas, and tours of processing facilities.  Presenters on each tour represent a wide range of interest areas providing a clear balance of perspectives. 

Tours include mini-courses on tree identification, wildlife habitat issues, water quality and other riparian considerations in forest management, soil characteristics, ecosystem management, conservation and preservation of sensitive and special areas of the forest, as well as the social and economic values we gain from the forest.

Find out more at the Festival of Forestry website:  www.festivalofforestry.org/Festival_of_Forestry/Welcome.html.

22nd Annual PWC Global Forest and Paper Industry Conference
14 May, 2009, Westin Bayshore Resort and Marina, Vancouver, BC

Join CEOs, senior forest and paper executives, industry analysts, customers and government policy makers from around the world as they discuss the challenges and opportunities facing global forest and paper industry. This one-day conference will once again include a panel of CEOs from the world's leading forest product companies.

For more information go to: www.pwc.com/extweb/ncevents.nsf/docid/63974C1F63C4576B85257536007E5F31