The Great Log Export Drain

Depending on the age and quality of the log, real value-added would mean transforming those logs into the studs and joists that frame our houses, the floors we walk on or the acoustic guitars and pianos we play. [...] Assuming that enough mills were built to handle the nearly 6.3 million cubic metres of logs that left the province in 2016, and assuming that those mills matched the provincial average in terms of jobs generated per unit of wood, another 3,650 men and women could be working in the industry. [...] And in recent years, the largest increase in exports has been from Crown lands under provincial government control, underscoring the link between policy choices by the government of former Premier Gordon Campbell and the consistently high level of exports from Crown lands in recent years. [...] And a new move afoot by the company has both forest industry workers and environmental activists convinced that the company is laying the groundwork for even more exports in the years to come. [...] Work underway by TimberWest near a pulp mill in Crofton, south of Nanaimo, is setting the stage for the company to load even more raw logs into the holds of ocean freighters, a move that will earn the company higher returns for each raw log.