BC Exporting Record Amount Of Raw Logs (And Jobs)

“Growing up in small-town Vancouver Island, I never met anyone who agreed with raw log exports. Even my most conservative, pro-extraction relatives froth with anger at the mere mention of this practice.”  

- Torrance Coste

The following is from Northern Insight/Perceptivity - March 14, 2012

In the last year, the Pacific Northwest (BC, WA, OR) exported well more than $1 billion worth of raw softwood logs to China. Shipments for 2011 were more than in the preceding five years combined. 

Increased demand for logs might be great for the logging industry, but it results in closures and layoffs at sawmills and other wood processing facilities. 

A few corporations do well harvesting logs in British Columbia but, without subsequent processing, many service and supply businesses that serve the industry are starving. We are not merely shipping logs to China; we are exporting jobs that ensured our own prosperity. 

BC government policy once allowed only for export of logs surplus to local needs. They still make the claim but, from the time Gordon Campbell's Liberals took power in 2001, raw log exports soared. 

Political and economic pressures prevent BC mills from interfering with overseas shipments. One of the province's largest sawmill operators told a public meeting that he was pressured to NOT bid on logs slated for export even though his mills were critically short of fibre. 

BC sends trade missions to China to sell more unprocessed logs while people in small communities all over the province witness the closure of sawmills and other wood manufacturers. 

When the last BC mill closes, will we be able to afford finished lumber to build our homes? Actually, the plutocracy has an answer for that: "Home ownership is an unrealistic dream of today's young people." 

See much more on raw log exports (and many other things of interest to British Columbians and other concerned Canadians) at the Northern Insight/Perceptivity Blog lovingly researched and written by super-citizen Norm Farrell.

Read Terrance Coste's recent article concerning BC's troubling raw log export addiction on the Tyee website.

BC Liberal Government Triples Raw Log Exports

Old-growth logs leaving the Gordon River area near Port Renfrew. The logs may also leave
British Columbia and Canada on their way to be processed in foreign mills.   

Photo by TJ Watt

BC Liberal Government More Than Tripled Raw Log Exports to Foreign Mills

Media Release, May 7, 2013 

The BC Liberal government more than tripled the amount of unprocessed, raw logs leaving the province to foreign mills during their reign of power, according to recent figures provided by BC’s Ministry of Forests, Lands, and Natural Resource Operations (Min. of FLNRO) to the Ancient Forest Alliance (AFA). 

From 2002 to 2012, over 47 million cubic meters of raw logs were exported from BC to foreign mills in China, the USA, Japan, Korea, and other nations. This contrasts to about 14.8 million cubic meters from 1991 to 2001 under the NDP government. Over the past two years alone, in 2011 and 2012, record levels of raw logs were exported from BC, 13.2 million cubic meters in total. 

“The BC Liberals have decimated the province’s forestry workforce through massive raw log exports, industry deregulation, and unsustainable practices. 30,000 BC forest workers lost their jobs and over 70 mills were shut down under the BC Liberals, yet they've allowed companies to cut at near record levels,” stated Arnold Bercov, national forestry officer of the Pulp, Paper, and Woodworkers of Canada. “Under the BC Liberals, we lost both our forests and our jobs, it’s nuts.”

Read the rest of the release at the Ancient Forest Alliance website.

Liberals ignoring committee on raw log exports: Dix

Overseas shipment of raw logs

I was wandering through the Ancient Forest Alliance's website and came across an important news item. I thought it worthy of sharing so the citizens of BC can learn what the present government is doing with our forests. The raw log export situation in the province should enrage both environmentalists and forestry workers alike.

NDP leader demands explanation for decision to send timber overseas rather than sell it to B.C. producers

The Vancouver Sun - Jonathan Fowlie, March 14, 2012

The B.C. Liberal government has, since December, been exporting raw logs that its own advisory committee has been saying should be going to producers in B.C.

On Tuesday, New Democratic Party leader Adrian Dix said the Timber Export Advisory Committee (TEAC) deter-mined last December that logs from Quatsino Sound on Vancouver Island should be sold to Teal-Jones of Surrey instead of being shipped overseas.

But Minister of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations Steve Thomson overruled that recommendation, Dix said, allowing the logs to be sold into foreign markets.

"The minister owes people an explanation for his decision," Dix said during question period Tuesday.

"The committee made the determination that keeping those logs in British Columbia was better for our economy than exporting them, and the minister overruled them."

Thomson said his ministry rejected the recommendation because TEAC had changed the way it was evaluating whether or not logs should be sold to foreign buyers.

"Without just taking their advice directly, in this case because we knew there was policy implications that needed to be considered, we administered the policy the way that it had always been administered and the way they had previously been providing advice to us," Thomson said Tuesday, adding the committee has no regulatory function, and is an advisory body only.

"It's not a process of overruling TEAC," he continued, "it's a process of a shift in policy advice being received from the advisory committee."

Ministry staff said the issue stretches beyond Teal-Jones, and has affected about 150 applications since December, comprising about 116,000 cubic metres of timber.

The ministry said that staff overturned TEAC recommendations on 86 applications in December and January, covering 70,145 cubic metres.

In February, the ministry stopped referring anything to the committee from the west coast of Vancouver Island, as they expected the decisions would be overturned. There were 47 offers in February, comprising 35,532 cubic metres.

In March, TEAC requested it be allowed to review cases again, and government agreed. The committee has so far reviewed 18 offers for 10,168 cubic metres, staff said.

Thomson said he has met with members of the committee and is reviewing the change they made in December to deter-mine if it's something government is willing to adopt.

"We're continuing to review that with [TEAC] and we've committed to get back to them," he said, adding he will have an answer before the committee's next meeting in April.

"But because there was a change in determination and a change in policy in terms of their advice we know we needed to look at this and have a discussion around the implications of the policy."

At issue in the matter is the way TEAC judges fair market value for logs.

As of December, the commit-tee began looking at domestic offers for coastal logs that did not include the costs to ship the logs to the buyer. This represents a change from before, where the offer made for the logs had to include the cost of freight.

It means domestic offers can potentially be more competitive than before.

On Tuesday, NDP forest critic Norm Macdonald said the issue goes beyond the details of how to calculate market value, adding the key is all about jobs.

"You have manufacturers that are ready. You have Teal-Jones that has gone through the process. This is a company that produces jobs," said Macdonald. "You have a host of companies that are ready, and these are the crumbs we're talking about that go through this advisory committee. These are the crumbs, and even them - this minister will deny those mills."

In 2011, British Columbia exported 5.87 million cubic metres of coastal raw logs. That was up from the 3.86 million cubic metres that were exported from the coast in 2010.

Stop old growth logging, now. Stop the export of BC raw logs and BC jobs. Retool sawmills for sustainable 2nd or 3rd growth smaller-log forest industry. Replant the backlog of logged-off lands.

The Dry Beam: Bulk Log Carriers and Whole Log Exports

The Dry Beam bulk log carrier, one of the largest in the world,
in Victoria, BC after being damaged at sea. Photo: GVHA

I saw a Washington forest last week without leaving Canada. It was a horizontal forest of raw logs that was laid out on Pier B at Ogden Point in Victoria, BC. Although these weren't trees from Vancouver Island, they reminded me that BC, like Washington, is increasingly sending raw logs to oversea markets.

The forest of logs on Pier B was from one of the world's largest bulk log carriers, the 186 meter (610 ft) Dry Beam. It ran into trouble last December early in its trip from Washington to Japan when a 10-15 meter (32-50 ft) rogue wave hit it, knocked the timber off track, and severely damaged the ship. Many logs went overboard into the north Pacific swells.

Logs on Ogden Point Pier from Dallas Road

The Dry Beam limped into Victoria, unloaded its cargo onto the pier, and underwent repairs so it could continue on its dangerous 8000 km (5000 mile) voyage. But it's not just dangerous for the ship's crew. The more important dangers are in British Columbia's forests.

Our forests, and forest industry, are being irreversibly altered by short term planning. Since 2002, the BC Liberal government has slashed more than 1100 jobs from the Forests ministry, gutting its ability to monitor this precious resource.

During the same time the forest industry lost over 20,000 jobs, and 70 mills shut down. As this has been happening, whole log exports have increased.

Deregulation of coastal forests has relieved forest companies of the requirement to mill their logs locally. This has caused a massive increase in the export of BC whole logs to foreign mills on giant ships like the Dry Beam.

Cutting down trees thousands of years old
is not sustainable, photo: TJ Watt

In 2006, the forests ministry recorded 320,000 cubic metres of whole log exports, rising to 534,000 cubic metres in 2010. Exports jumped 160% last year.

Bulk log carriers are floating our forests, via port facilities in Prince Rupert, to destinations such as China, Japan, and Korea. Along with our whole logs go the jobs that would employ thousands of British Columbians in a variety of value added activities.

We should be as outraged about the practice of shipping whole logs to foreign markets as the Haida were in 1996 when bulk log carriers were leaving Haida land with the very trees that made much of Haida culture possible - its sacred cedars.

"On August 1, 1996 Christian White and crew paddled out into Masset Inlet in a cedar canoe to confront the log carrier the "Haida Brave." The log carrier was loaded with cedar trees that had been cut from MacMillan Bloedel's TFL 39. This action by Christian and crew, and supported by 8 other boats and 70-odd witnesses on the beach was to give notice to MacMillan Bloedel and other forest companies on Haida Gwaii that the current policy of clearcutting the Islands is not acceptable." - from a conversation with C. White, and R. Stocker, spruceroots.org

Read more about the Haida blockade that helped popularize the plight of old growth forests on Haida Gwaii here. The Haida provide a way of viewing nature and the forest that the rest of BC would be wise to follow. They gave notice, as should we.

Haida giving notice in 1996 - "We are re-assuming control
of our forests in order to preserve them for the future"
photo: spruceroots.org

Let's give notice to the government and forest companies that current forest policies are unacceptable. Let's tell them we expect complete protection of all remaining old growth forests in places like southern Vancouver Island where the original forest is near-extinct. Let's tell them we want to stop whole log shipments, and keep forestry-related jobs at home.

Let's become a rogue wave of protest and stop the ships of destruction that are sailing unchecked through our faltering forests.