Mobile equipment is essential to day-to-day operations, but it also presents a serious hazard. Large trucks, forklifts, loaders, and delivery vehicles often operate in close proximity to pedestrians, while busy yards can have limited sightlines and multiple contractors on site. Safe passage is possible, however, with proper controls. Through engineering controls, dedicated safety committees, and collaboration with WorkSafeBC officers, two major B.C. forest-products employers are building safer pathways for workers, contractors, and visitors. At West Fraser Timber Co. Ltd., the employer’s safety approach shows up across its operations — including Cariboo Pulp, Williams Lake Plywood, and WestPine MDF — while Millar Western Forest Products Ltd. focuses its safety leadership at Quesnel River Pulp. These operations use a mobile equipment pedestrian interface (MEPI) system — a safety approach that layers a variety of control measures to prevent injury from struck-by incidents. [This article first appeared in the spring issue of WorkSafe Magazine, shared here with their permission. Subscribe for free here.]
The Trump administration intends to maintain tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada, US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said as the US launches negotiations to revamp the North American free trade pact. The US has “significant” trade issues with Canada. …”The US is going to have tariffs,” Greer said. “I mean, even with somebody like Mexico, or other countries that are in our own hemisphere, we’re going to have tariffs as long as we have a giant trade deficit.” His comments that the 6-year-old US-Mexico-Canada Agreement will not continue as a tariff-free trade pact echo comments he made privately last month to industry executives in Mexico — that auto and steel tariffs will remain in place under the revamped USMCA. …Greer said the Trump administration’s issues with Canada go well beyond trade “irritants” and it was difficult to see how the two can work out their differences.
OTTAWA – A small group of cities across the country drove Canada’s progress on diversifying trade in 2025, while others fell behind, says a new report from the Canadian Chamber of Commerce. The report says Calgary, Ottawa-Gatineau, Toronto, Saskatoon and Kelowna, B.C., are the cities that made the strongest gains in export diversification beyond the U.S. market last year. Of the cities surveyed, Calgary and Ottawa-Gatineau posted the largest increases in exports to non-U.S. markets between 2024 and 2025 — 64.67 per cent and 64.04 per cent, respectively. … The chamber’s new report says recent Statistics Canada data on business responses to U.S. tariffs suggests many Canadian firms are “adapting cautiously” rather than fundamentally repositioning their operations. The report says that while exports to non-U.S. markets rose sharply between 2024 and 2025, much of that growth came from existing exporters expanding their reach rather than new firms entering global markets. 
The United States’ top trade official says he’s pushing for changes to continental trade rules to prioritize U.S. content in manufacturing supply chains, but sees a path to preferential tariff rates in North America if Canada and Mexico co-operate with external tariffs on other countries. At the same time, Jamieson Greer warned that negotiations with Canada around the future of the country’s auto sector could be difficult, while discussions about trade in commodities should prove easier. …Canada has not yet started formal talks with the U.S. and won’t be at the negotiating table this week in Mexico City. The three governments have to decide on July 1 whether to extend the agreement for 16 years or move to a period of annual reviews for 10 years. …Ottawa has signalled an openness to this type of “Fortress North America” approach. But Prime Minister Mark Carney wants to see the U.S. lower its sectoral tariffs on automobiles, steel, aluminum, copper and wood products in return for moves toward deeper integration in key sectors. [A Globe and Mail subscription is required for full access to this story]
FORT ST. JOHN, B.C. — The sale of a former sawmill owned by industry giant Canfor in Fort St. John could be happening very soon. According to a news tip received by Energeticcity.ca, a purchase by a salvage company based in the province’s interior was “99 per cent complete” with the new ownership possessing the property and hourly employees would have their last shift on Friday, May 29th, at midnight. The sawmill at 9312 259 Road was announced as closing in 2024, following a “systematic, orderly wind-down process” affecting 220 jobs. However, when approached by Energeticcity.ca, media relations representative of Canfor, Mina Laudan, said that no sale has been finalized as of yet.
A B.C. forestry company embroiled in insolvency proceedings has been handed a $429,000 penalty and two-year ban from hiring migrant workers after it was found to have violated several federal regulations. The sanctions to San Industries (part of the San Group) came after federal inspectors found it had breached five sections of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations, rules designed to protect temporary foreign workers. According to a May 15 decision, inspectors found pay or working conditions did not match what San Industries had advertised. The employer was also found not to be engaged in the business the workers were hired for and could not show that the job it had sought to fill matched its Labour Market Impact Assessment application. And in another violation, San Industries was found to have broken federal or provincial laws for hiring and recruiting employees. …At $429,000, the penalty is the province’s second-largest on record.
SAULT STE. MARIE — The Ontario government is investing more than $14 million to build a modern, digital system to inventory the province’s forest resources, giving industry access to better information to invest, grow and create jobs. …this investment will modernize the Forest Resources Inventory (FRI) Information Management System, the essential database of Ontario’s managed forests, by replacing outdated systems with cutting-edge technology to make critical forest data more accurate, accessible and easier to use. …Through a strategic partnership with Microsoft, powered by Databricks technology, the province is developing customized digital tools to modernize how Ontario collects, stores and shares forest inventory information, strengthening the sector’s long-term competitiveness and resilience in the global economy. This work is a key commitment in the 
Rising mortgage rates aren’t the only thing freezing the housing market. Builders are contending with a fresh wave of sticker shock on the job site, as soaring prices for copper, lumber, diesel and aluminum drive up the cost of putting homes in the ground. A mix of geopolitical turmoil, tariffs and supply-chain disruptions is rippling through construction materials markets at a moment when affordability is already stretched thin, the Wall Street Journal reported. The result is higher costs for developers, more uncertainty for homebuilders and even fewer paths to affordable homeownership. Copper has become one of the industry’s biggest headaches. …Lumber prices are climbing again, too. Canadian sawmill closures and tariffs tied to the long-running U.S.-Canada softwood dispute have tightened supply heading into peak building season. …The broader concern for developers is that construction inflation could become self-reinforcing. Higher material costs feed broader inflation fears, which in turn keep borrowing costs elevated. 
B.C.’s housing market remained tepid into April as sales pointing to another disappointing spring market. Seasonally adjusted home sales decreased by 1.1 per cent in April to 5,227 units after a 0.5 per cent drop in March. This was also the lowest monthly figure since November 2023. …Weak housing market conditions are likely to progress in the near term given the shaky geopolitical climate, sluggish economic growth and weak labour market conditions. …On the manufacturing front, sales in B.C. rose marginally in March. …Wood product manufacturing also declined for the third consecutive month, falling 2.4 per cent to $728 million. This represents the lowest level since May 2020, when sales were $623 million. Year to date, durable goods sales are up 2.6 per cent.
Canada Wood Japan has helped secure an important market-access outcome for Canadian Hem-Fir (N) dimension lumber in Japan. In collaboration with the National Lumber Grades Authority and the Canadian Lumber Standards Accreditation Board, Canada Wood Japan worked with Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism to obtain recognition of the revised standard design values for Hem-Fir (N) dimension lumber graded under NLGA standards. For builders, designers and structural engineers in Japan, design values are essential. They provide the basis for structural calculations and help determine where and how lumber can be used in code-compliant buildings. When grading rules or design values are revised in Canada, those changes must also be properly understood and accepted by Japanese regulatory authorities to ensure continued market access. …Canada Wood Japan demonstrated that the revised Hem-Fir (N) design values would continue to meet Japan’s structural safety requirements and would not compromise the performance of conventional wooden buildings. 
Experts are calling on the B.C. government to halt logging in a Tsitika watershed cutblock on northern Vancouver Island that has been designated for old-growth deferral. But the some First Nations whose territory it falls in say they have their own approach to managing the area sustainably. Pacific Wild, an environmental organization, says B.C. Timber Sales (BCTS) is selling off rare and ecologically significant forests for minimal economic return. In letters sent to BCTS and other government decision-makers in April, the organization presented new data, maps and field evidence showing that cutblock TA1375 — identified by the Old Growth Technical Advisory Panel as a Priority Deferral Area — provides essential habitat for threatened species and stores significant amounts of carbon. The cutblock was auctioned in March despite opposition from scientists, community members and many First Nations whose territories overlap with the Tsitika watershed.
Residents and visitors to Cowichan Bay on Saturday, May 30 take note. A large-scale exercise to help emergency responders train for potential wildfires is taking place in Cowichan Bay from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. “Please do not be alarmed and help ensure crews can safely complete their training by obeying signage and giving personnel and equipment plenty of space,” said CVRD spokesperson Lisa Moilanen. The exercise will include Shawnigan Lake, Malahat, Mill Bay, Cowichan Bay, Duncan, Sahtlam, Ladysmith, and North Oyster fire departments, as well as BC Wildfire Services and more “working, practicing and learning together to help be aligned, prepared and keep our communities safe,” Moilanen added. The exercise features a scenario where a forest fire is threatening a developed area or community. Moilanen said people will notice emergency vehicles, personnel, traffic cones, and wildfire response activities around Falcon Crescent, and Wilmot, Galdwell, Rondeault, and Hillbank Roads.
HAZELTON – The Forest Practices Board will audit the forest planning and practices of BC Timber Sales (BCTS) and timber sale licence holders in the Kispiox Timber Supply Area (TSA) portion of the Skeena Business Area, starting Monday, June 1, 2026. The audit will examine harvesting, roads, silviculture, protection activities and associated planning. These activities will be assessed for compliance under the Forest and Range Practices Act and the Wildfire Act. BCTS operates throughout the Kispiox TSA, within the Skeena Stikine Natural Resource District. Activities in the audit area are administered from the Hazelton Field Office. The audit area overlaps the territories of the Gitxsan, Wet’suwet’en, Gitanyow, Nisga’a, Lake Babine Nation, Kitselas, and Tsetsaut Skii km Lax Ha First Nations. …The area includes mountainous terrain, rivers and lakes that support recreation, wildlife habitat and important fish populations, including several salmon species, bull trout, Dolly Varden and lake trout.
Three years ago, Barb Round heard heavy machinery chewing through the urban forest behind her home in Campbell River, a small city on east Vancouver Island that bills itself as the salmon capital of the world. Round waved down a man in a hard hat and asked why the excavator was working in the greenway, which is a haven for birds, dotted with pocket wetlands and adjacent to Simms Creek, home to four salmon species. “He explained to me that the property had been sold,” Round, a retired nurse, tells The Tyee. “Everyone in the neighbourhood thought it was protected land.” When residents found out a local developer planned to cut down much of the forest and fill in the wetlands to build a large housing development near the creek, “they were gobsmacked,” Round says.
It will soon be mandatory for commercial trucks in B.C. to have dash cameras. B.C. Conservative MLA Ward Stamer introduced a bill after a string of deadly collisions on Highway 5, which goes through his riding of Kamloops-North Thompson. British Columbia is the first Canadian jurisdiction to require commercial dash cameras. Stamer says cameras will help keep drivers accountable and ensure there will be enough evidence in the event of a crash. The bill requires outward-facing dash cameras on commercial trucks travelling B.C. highways and will come into force six months after receiving royal assent. “This bill started with families along Highway 5 who have buried loved ones after preventable crashes. It finishes with B.C. leading the country on commercial vehicle safety,” said Stamer in a release.
