Monthly Archives: March 2019

Alberni Pacific Division Sawmill in Port Alberni will be closing for a month starting on March 18. Western Forest Products owns and operates the mill. “We are temporarily suspending operations for a four-week period starting on March 18,” WFP director of communications Babita Khunkhun confirmed late Friday, March 8. “This decision is directly related to market conditions. Our APD facility mainly produces products for the Japanese market, so it’s related to market demand for that product.” Khunkhun said employees at APD have been advised of the shutdown. When asked if there is a solid date for when the mill would restart, she said the shutdown is for four weeks. “We have advised our employees that it will be for a four-week period. If it changes we will advise them at that time.”

Canadian Women in Timber is a registered non-profit, charitable society whose goal is to enhance and foster public understanding of BC’s forest resources and sustainable forest management. This October we will celebrate our 30-year anniversary! We encourage sound management and wise use of our forest resources and believe a viable forest industry and healthy forests go hand-in-hand. We are dedicated to informing the public regarding our forests and the forest industry by promoting forest awareness through education. A good deal of this education is focused on school children as they are the decision makers of the future. Given this knowledge we hope to inspire future generations to cherish our forests and lead a thriving forest industry for Canada. Canadian Women in Timber was established in 1989 and is a truly grassroots organization.

…In its quarterly State of the Market report for the Urban Development Institute, real estate research firm Urban Analytics said that the number of concrete condos that were either released for presale or completed and unsold, at the end of 2018’s fourth quarter, was quadruple that of one year prior. …The number of available new wood-framed condo units… did not climb as much as concrete condos, but they account for a much smaller share of the market. Urban Analytics said that there were 1,013 released and unsold new wood frame condos at the end of Q4 2018. This is only a nine per cent increase from the previous quarter but a 164 per cent increase year-over-year. However, when compared with the many more units available five years ago, at the end of 2013, this is a 68 per cent decline.

Tanya Wick

Does the diversity strategy in your workplace amount to posters in the lunchroom? I hope not. Don’t get me wrong – I believe communication has an important role to play in shifting culture and increasing diversity. But if our strategies start and finish with communication campaigns, we won’t create the real change we need. We have done a good job in recent years to raise awareness about how important diversity is to the bottom line and to the future of the forestry industry.  If we are to continue to grow, it will be crucial to have a diverse, engaged workforce. More than that, we know that diverse companies are more profitable, more innovative and more sustainable. What we need now is to translate that knowledge into execution. It’s time to go beyond awareness and take action.

Norman Yakeleya

The national chief of the Dene Nation says a proposed Forest Act from the Northwest Territories government is an affront to treaty rights and Indigenous authority. Norman Yakeleya said the territorial government consulted with some, but not all, of the Dene Nation’s member nations when writing the draft legislation. The legislation is scheduled for first and second reading this year prior to the fall election, and it applies to regions as far north as the Sahtu. The territorial government is amending and combining two existing acts — the Forest Management Act and the Forest Protection Act — to create the Forest Act. According to the government’s website, the new act will include management of non-timber forest products, like biomass, requirements on industry to make fire prevention plans, and the recognition and affirmation of Aboriginal and Treaty rights. …The first reading of Forest Act will happen Friday in the N.W.T. Legislative Assembly.