Joan Atkinson

The closure of the Paper Excellence pulp mill in Mackenzie comes as a disappointing, but not entirely unexpected, blow to the forestry dependent community. Mackenzie Mayor Joan Atkinson says the past nine months have brought feelings of uncertainty in her area. “We were always hoping that mill would come back. …Paper Excellence made the announcement Thursday, citing the facility’s small production capacity and the ongoing lack of economic fibre. …Atkinson says the challenges with getting fibre for the mill quickly became ‘next to impossible’ after the closure of the Canfor mill in July 2019. …Canfor continues to harvest in the Mackenzie timber supply area but moves those logs elsewhere to process. “The resource.. is still providing huge profits to the companies that are harvesting in the Mackenzie TSA,” said Atkinson. She hopes tenure will be taken back and redistributed to support local positions, possibly adding other mill locations in the future.