Just a tidbit from the Saskatchewan government’s throne speech this afternoon – among the “vision quest” announcements included is a proposal to transform 10% of the arable land in Saskatchewan to “harvestable forest” over the next 20 years.
10% is around 1.8 million hectares.
OK.
If I understand the issue correctly (and I reserve the right to be wrong) the Calvert government is suggesting – which means promoting the concept with bagloads of public money – that thousands of farmers who currently produce grains and oilseeds convert their land and equipment to tree planting, take a multi-decade hiatus from economic return and then, I suppose, call in the commercial lumber harvesters to cash in at about the time they’re ready to retire.
Well, nix that. The average Saskatchewan farmer’s age is around 60 years. So, what we are really talking about is this – Calvert expects them to sell their holdings to large corporate interests who can.
I suspect that a lot of those on marginal farmland in the northern edge of the province’s grainbelt would jump at the chance. On its face, “agro forestry” isn’t a bad idea, nor is it a new concept – it’s how much of the privately owned softwood lumber industry does business in the US.
Except, if I am not mistaken, there is well-publicized multi-billion dollar softwood lumber dispute centered on US claims that Canadian lumber production is currently subsidized through artificially low stumpage fees collected by the government on natural trees harvested from crown lands – fees so low that private American producers can’t compete because of the actual costs incurred in growing and harvesting trees commercially.
So which side are we on, again?
Why, on the side of collectivist, socialist, micro-management, central control of the market, where else?
It’s the Canadian way!
As Doug noted above, dat’s da Canadian Value, eh?
I’m just amazed at how many Canadians haven’t figured it out: The below-market-value stumpage fees that Canadian lumber companies are paying to certain provices, to enable their profitably dumping lumber at non-competitive prices in the US, means these companies, with compliant provincial government acquiescence, are ripping off the people of these provinces with this trick.
In effect, these companies are getting the Canadian taxpayers of these provinces to pay the market price differential by their provincial governments’ receiving a less-than-market-value price for lumber from these public lands from which the lumber in contention is harvested.
BOTH American lumber companies AND Canadian citizens are being ripped off, big-time!
And many Canadians are, like little robots, being wound up with reflexive anti-US zenophobia when they should be raising hell with their corrupt and/or incompetent elected officials, who are going along with this massive Canadian lumber industry scam.
wasn’t Clavert converting Sask into growing corn or whatever fo biofuel . . some other nirvana schem to save the world ??
DavePA couldn’t said that better if I tried.
Well done.
Dave, your’s is a minority view, yet equal to my own and entirely correct.
If we understand this issue however, it is not so much the lumber as it is the need to restore a vanishing water table.
The trickle coming in from Alberta continues to diminish and parts of Southern Saskatchewan are headed for parchdome.
This move should have been made years ago. 73s TG
Artificially low stumpage fees — compared to what? I don’t buy that argument for reasons of simple geography. The land area of British Columbia is close to one million square kilometers; the combined areas of Washington, Oregon, Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming is not quite 1.3 million square kilometers. Additionally, there are about three times as many people in those US states as in BC. It stands to reason there’s a hell of a lot more forest land in BC than in those six states combined, thus a much larger supply, thus the price for timber rights on that land is going to be lower.
Mind you, I’m not exactly sure where the US lumber lobby is primarily based out of, but I’d bet you can run the same numbers for whatever states they happen to be and come out with similar results.
Whoops.. should read five states, not six.
Ian, Quebec just got a $450 million provincial timber subsidy and an additional 50 million from the feds.
Do you suppose US watchdogs would have the gall to read the Montrel Gazette where these grants were made public?
Could you look up *softwood subsidy* or * Timber subsidy* in your Halfax papers?
I wonder when the last gift to the Nova Scotia industry was given.
The 27% penalty will probably fade away when we give the people’s trees to the forestry giants through fair auction, as the Americans do. TG
Saskachewan goes its own way. courting the communist chinese with their oil reserves but never hitting the corporate boardrooms in Canada or the US. they have a leasing system that matches Albertas but just cant get it together because no matter what way they paint it the stripes are always the same- like a zebra – subject to reversal , black on white or white on black . you just cant trust the NDP.
Well DougPA, what you said is basically your tipical american Bull Sh*t. The lumber isn’t so much sold cheaper because of stumpage fees (as has been decided in the courts in favor of Canadian lumber companies 6 or 8 times in the last decade or so,but you don’t want to admit that, do you)but the Canadian mills are more efficient and the Canadian dollar makes it cheaper as well.
“And many Canadians are, like little robots, being wound up with reflexive anti-US zenophobia when they should be raising hell with their corrupt and/or incompetent elected officials, who are going along with this massive Canadian lumber industry scam”.
And what scam might that be. The duties go to the American lumber companies-the same ones you say are being ripped off. The ones being rippied off are the Canadian companies(and their workers) and the American CONSUMER.
The controversy of stumpage fee vs the auction method used in the US is basically this; we’re the Americans and we do it this way so we think EVERYBODY should do it this way.
Hm, no where have I heard that before.Typical Amercian attitude.
Next time ,before you shoot your yankee face off do a little bit of research so at least you sound like you know what you are talking about.
Horny Toad
Kate, I’ve begun to think you may be right about climate change: adaptation may be the only way to go. So why, why is our government talking about trying to move forests SOUTH??!!!
This is a very controversial issue. WHO says that Canadian lumber is subsidized and ‘has the potential’ to hurt the US industry so no duty should be charged. The US courts have agreed but the politics is way out of line.
BC is the largest exporter of forestry products in the world. Stumpage is based on what the end value of the wood could be and it is not low. In addition to the stumpage, there are development costs for roads, restoration, etc that private woodlot owners only have to pay once. It is hard to compare apples to apples in this discussion.
Having said that, I have never heard the other argument as to why Canada’s stumpage system could not be changed. I know it sticks in our craw to change the system simply because the Americans insist upon it, but are we simply cutting our nose off to spite our face? Is our system better? What benefits does it offer? Is it more stable? Does it allow industry to plan better? As far as allowing large companies to control the industry, the current stumpage and allotment system has virtually eliminated any chance of small operators making a go of it. In spite of recent changes in BC, this holds true for both BC and Alberta. So, what are the arguments supporting our stumpage system? This is a serious question; I would honestly like to know.
Hate to say it- but Hemp grows a lot faster than trees. (And it is already B.C.’s largest cash crop.) Bwahhahaha!
WHO says that Canadian lumber is subsidized and ‘has the potential’ to hurt the US industry so no duty should be charged.”
huh???????????????
Horny Toad
Wayne, if you were the government and you had the authority to award tree lot licenses to the big timber companies, Would you be inclined to favour the bigger firms depending upon the size of the *donation* to your re-election fund?
In other words, are you just as human as I am?
Public auctions out in the open allow the public to see competition in action.
Livestock auctions seem to work well enough. Cattle producers are not known for making a crooked killing. Middlemen, on the other hand, operate behind closed doors. Is that why beef can cost so much?
If going to the timber auction system saves us 27%, are we only 27% idiots by remaining stubborn? TG
Tony, I’d hope you are aware that the Atlantic provinces are exempt from the American countervailing duties on softwood lumber because the majority of timber cut out here comes from private woodlots instead of Crown land. If not, I’d suggest you check the Halifax papers instead of me.
As for Quebec, that wouldn’t surprise me. Government graft is about the only thing you can count on in that province.
No Ian. I was not aware of that. Now I’m sure I know everything. Thanks. It’s just great, this profit by debate… eh?
Obviously, there is no need now for anyone to check Halifax news archives for subsidies given to the forestry industry. As harvesting is from privately held land, as you suggest, there are no subsidies to N.S. timber harvestors.
Did you forget to make your point? Do you think we should continue to butt our heads on 27%, or wise up and get with the program? 73s TG
I am no expert at the softwood issue, but I do know that is is not as cut and dried as PM Martin would like to think.
My response to some of the posters that say what is wrong with subsidizing the lumber? It seems to me that free enterprise and open markets are the way to go. Why would someone still like to hang on to a century old way of subsidizing commodities? Governments only screw up things when they try to manipulate markets. Why is it that some CDNs are so dead set against the lumber being sold at auctions? What, it might be more effecient?
As far as Saskatchewan goes, it has many things going for it as long as the government stays out of it.
The auction system may reduce the government’s ability to control how much is charged, and where the fibre is allocated. Currently, the big companies own and control most of the long term licenses. Small scale salvage with annual non re-newable licenses is the norm for smaller operators. Perhaps it is simply a matter of government control and influence?
http://www.dogwoodinitiative.org/newsstories/victoria_environmentalist_joins_pms_inner_circle
Mar 11, 2005 Times Colonist
….”a Victoria environmental lawyer — began work in the prime minister’s department of the Privy Council Office March 1.
Boyd’s report calls for Ottawa to:
**** put an end to billions of dollars in subsidies to the forest***** mining, fishing, fossil fuel, agricultural and nuclear industries, and end nuclear power generation and large-scale hydroelectric projects completely.”
~~~
No excuse for Martin to claim that NO subsidies exist.
Maz – you may notice your off topic comment was deleted. Next time, use the readers tips post.
Isn’t PA losing the Weyerhauser pulp and paper mill at the end of the year in a pullout and shutdown? Who would have thought that would ever happen given it’s a state of the art mill? How do you get landowners to plant trees for harvest 25-30 years down the road given the market risks involved?
Whatever you do, don’t plant jack and lodgepole pine.
Pulp and paper is a different animal than lumber. My brother-in-law has been with Weyerhauser for years. I had a conversation with him a couple of years ago and jokingly said, ‘it did not appear that that computers had saved any trees so far’, alluding to the theory that we would have a paperless society.
He was quite clear that although the last 20 years had seen a dramatic increase in paper use as we all printed out all the wonderful documents we could now produce, industry was catching on. He mentioned the medical industry in particular, but said it was common in others as well. The use of paper by the medical industry has dropped by 40% over the past 10 years. He is 60 years old and said that if he was younger, her would get out because the pulp and paper industry was a dying industry.
When you consider what is happening to the readership of the major newspapers, the trees are probably safer every year.
enough about stumpage bumpage and everything else. Why don’t we just sell the Americans tables and chairs and let them use their own lumber for building houses?