Softwood Forest Products Buyer - January/February 2019

“Growing the Pie”

“Growing the Pie” Through Better Forest Policy By Nick Smith, Healthy Forest, Healthy Communities Nick Smith Americans have an insatiable appetite for wood products. At a minimum it takes one tree, 16 inches in diameter by 100 feet tall, to satisfy the demands for every single citizen. Markets may rise and fall, but domestic demand will only continue to grow. A study by ForestEdge and Wood Resources International forecasts U.S. Softwood lumber demand will grow at an annual rate of 2.3 percent through 2030. As a reader of this newspaper, you already understand the North American Softwood lumber industry is intensely competitive, with manufacturers in the United States and Canada (and beyond) vying to meet this ever-growing demand. The business is often seen as a zero-sum game, where companies vie for limited supplies of Call It The Fun Side of Cedar. Who says siding has to be all about straight lines and uniform color? Specialty profiles of Western Red Cedar siding such as Haida Skirl add personality and individuality to your home. And that’s something no cement or plastic siding can do. Western Red Cedar gives you natural durability, long lasting street appeal and surprisingly little maintenance. Which leaves more time for the fun things in life. Make the right choice for your business, your customers and your environment. Western Red Cedar offers dependable performance, unmatched beauty and superior environmental credentials to composite decking and other man-made products. The choice of discerning builders and consumers alike, Western Red Cedar adds warmth, character and value to projects and significant returns to your business. WRCLA raw materials and workers to manufacture products and turn a profit. Fortunately, with strong demand for Softwood lumber there are opportunities to meet these challenges and “grow the pie” through good public policy. But for this to happen, everyone must be informed, be willing to engage, and be active in educating policymakers, stakeholders and the general public on the issues that affect us. Good public policy can strengthen the industry. But bad public policy based on misperceptions about forestry and wood products can threaten the industry’s very existence. That’s why everyone should advocate for solutions that grow and maintain the nation’s woodbasket, so companies across America have the raw materials to compete in a global economy. Everyone should advocate for solutions that secure and expand markets for the full range of forest products, from lumber to wood-based biomass that produces renewable energy. Ensuring a broad, viable and diverse forest sector, with access to healthy and diverse markets, will give all companies the opportunity to succeed. It will also help us compete with other sectors for qualified and capable workers. I encourage everyone in the business to look beyond the competition within the industry. Consider how everyone’s future will be shaped by the policies–laws and regulations–that are being decided right now. Policy battles are won by the people who show up and lost by those who sit on the sidelines. We all have a stake in the outcome–our companies, our communities, and our forests. I am based in the Pacific Northwest, which includes the top two Softwood lumber producing states in the nation. Most Softwood lumber manufacturers in Oregon and Washington, like other states in the region, are surrounded by public lands. They need access to federal wood to stay in business. The listing of the Northern Spotted Owl in 1990 led to a dramatic decline in timber harvests on forest lands owned by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. This led to the loss of sawmills, logging businesses, and the scores of other businesses that depend on a vibrant timber industry. The decline in federal timber harvests contributed to high unemployment and poverty in our rural communities, and many communities have never recovered. This fact is well-known, but the policymakers and the general public are only beginning to understand the environmental consequences of locking-up our federal forests and walking away. As timber harvesting has declined, the number of acres burned from catastrophic wildfire has increased exponentially. Today, forest mortality now exceeds net growth on America’s national forest timberlands based on data publicly available from the U.S. Forest Service. In 2016 forest growth was 48 percent of mortality, while timber harvests were just 11 percent of what is dying annually. Forest mortality continues to trend upward. In 2017 the agency estimated there were 6.3 billion dead standing trees in just 11 Western states. What do these data mean? Far more trees are dying due to Continued on page 50 Page 12 Softwood Forest Products Buyer n January/February 2019

Continuous wood drying greatness by Valutec Valutec is one of the world’s largest suppliers of drying equipment for the sawmill industry, with more than 4,000 lumber dry kilns delivered during nearly a century. Valutec’s TC continuous kilns combine extremely high capacity with game changing flexibility. Still, the end products impress with exactly the quality that you and your customer expect. Read more about the latest development in wood drying and all the features that made Pleasant River choose Valutec as their kiln supplier at www.valutec.ca Ingo Wallocha Managing Director Valutec Inc Mobile +1 778 868 3695 Phone +1 416 640 7478 ingo.wallocha@valutec.ca Softwood Forest Products Buyer n January/February 2019 Page 13