In celebration of Canada Day, the Tree Frog News team is taking a short break on Monday. We’ll return to our lily pad bright and early Wednesday morning with your full dose of forestry news and insight.
Wishing all our readers a safe and happy Canada Day! And with July 4th just around the corner, we also send our best wishes to our American readers for a safe and festive Independence Day!
Kelly, Sandy, Heidi and Suzi
Forestry Innovation Investment (FII) is proud to share our “Year in Review”, a compilation of market development activities completed by FII and our many industry, association, government, academic, and research partners over the past year. Throughout 2024/25, B.C.’s forest sector faced significant headwinds, as difficult industry and market dynamics were compounded by trade threats. Despite these ongoing challenges, the forest sector continues to play a vital role in B.C.’s economy and remains a key global supplier of sustainable forest products and advanced wood building systems. To support a resilient forest economy, FII and its partners are actively working to diversify markets for B.C. forest products both domestically and internationally—a goal that has become increasingly important amid current trade uncertainty. Our commitment to a collaborative delivery approach means we build on the strengths and shared resources that other organizations bring to this important work.
Domtar (formerly Paper Excellence) has signed a purchase agreement with Cranberry Business Park Ltd. for the sale of the remaining half of its lands at the former Tis’kwat paper mill site in Powell River. “We are looking forward to contributing to the economic future of Powell River and the region,” stated Craig Austin and Thomas Ligocki, from Cranberry Business Park Ltd., in a media release. “With waterfront access and abundant energy sources, this site has so much potential. We are proud to be part of the revitalization of the city’s Historic Townsite, alongside our neighbour at Tis’kwat, the Tla’amin Nation.” “It was a priority for Domtar to find a buyer who would ensure that the lands continue to generate jobs and economic benefit for the broader community well into the future,” stated Carlo Dal Monte, vice-president, Domtar Legacy Assets.
MACKENZIE — The District of Mackenzie has seen challenges in recent years with a downturn in British Columbia’s forestry industry, but Mayor Joan Atkinson said that diversifying into other industries has made a big impact on her community. … “We suffered a huge loss in taxation from 2024 to 2025 as a result of the closure of two large industrial facilities, but this community has always been resilient,” said Atkinson. …Canfor said it was indefinitely curtailing activity at its Mackenzie sawmill in July 2019. … Paper Excellence permanently shuttered its Mackenzie pulp mill in April 2021. Atkinson noted two factors that have helped the local forestry industry. The first was Forests Minister Ravi Parmar announcing a change in an appraisal system that makes it more economically viable for companies to operate in Northern BC. The second is ownership of nearby timber supply areas by First Nations.
The East Fraser Fibre mill in Quesnel was on fire Saturday, June 21, closing a stretch of Highway 97 at the intersection with Quesnel-Hixon Road. Firefighters from multiple departments including Quesnel Volunteer Fire Department (QVFD), Ten Mile Volunteer Fire Department and Barlow Creek Volunteer Fire Department responded to the blaze. “On arrival we had heavy smoke and flames exiting the roof of the building,” said QVFD chief Ron Richert. “Crews were on scene for almost 12 hours, until seven o’clock in the morning.” Crews were also called back to the East Fraser Fibre building to manage hot spots, where small fires in some areas of the building or grass outside flared up. Richert said the building is now clear of fibre but it is still under investigation.
VANCOUVER, BC – Canfor announced today its decision to permanently close the Estill and Darlington sawmills in South Carolina, effective August 2025. These closures follow an extended period of persistently weak market conditions and sustained financial losses, which have made continued operations at these facilities no longer viable. “We understand the significant impact this difficult decision will have on our employees,” said Lee Goodloe, President, Canfor Southern Pine. “This outcome is in no way a reflection of the dedication and hard work of our teams. We are committed to supporting our employees through this transition, including providing severance payments and exploring opportunities for redeployment within our other operations where possible.” Approximately 290 employees will be affected by the closures, which will also reduce Canfor’s U.S. lumber production capacity by 350 million board feet annually.
ONTARIO — A northern Ontario forestry company says a train crossing Highway 560 collided Wednesday morning with logs that were spilled by an overturned contractor’s trailer. It happened at the railroad crossing near Interfor’s Gogama Division and resulted in the road being closed between highways 144 and 560A. “There are no injuries or derailment,” Ontario Provincial Police said in a social media post at 8:40 a.m. “A train stop order is in place.” Interfor also confirmed this. …“At Interfor, the safety of our people and the communities where we operate is our highest priority. We are focused on supporting those affected and are actively monitoring the situation.” There is no estimated time of reopening, said OPP Const. Michelle Simard. “The officers are still investigating,” Simard said.
A new Canada-US trade deal will likely carry forward the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement tariff exemptions shielding most Canadian exports from American tariffs, says Deloitte Canada chief economist Dawn Desjardins. …US President Donald Trump has set July 9 as the deadline for countries to ink a trade deal in order to avoid his “Liberation Day” tariffs. For Canada, Prime Minister Mark Carney and Trump agreed on the sidelines of the recent G7 meeting in Alberta to strike a deal by July 21. “Our baseline view assumes that at a minimum, we continue to operate with our CUSMA carve-outs. “The sounds we’re hearing seem to be moving in the right direction. Obviously, I have no inside information. It’s just an assumption that we will not be severely hit by 25 per cent tariffs across the board.” …Deloitte Canada’s latest economic forecast, published on Wednesday, calls for a “modest recession” in the second and third quarters of the year. 
Most researchers today explore high-tech materials like carbon nanotubes or graphene to develop a class of composite known as radar-absorbing material, i.e., a composite that can attenuate radar signals for stealth applications. Such high-tech materials are costly and energy-intensive to produce. Researchers from Brazil and Canada have explored sustainable carbon made of tree bark waste as an affordable alternative to those options. Their findings were recently published in the 
TORONTO — A mass timber showcase on Toronto’s George Brown campus is also a study in collaboration and innovation. George Brown College’s Nerys Rau, Moriyama Teshima Architects partner Philip Silverstein and PCL’s Mike Love all explained the process behind building Limberlost Place at a session titled Exploring Limberlost Place: at the Canada Green Building Council’s Building Lasting Change conference held recently in downtown Vancouver. Limberlost Place is a 10-storey mass-timber net-zero building that achieved occupancy in January. …Silverstein said the building is rated at Tier 4 of the Toronto Green Standard, adding no other building in the city has reached that metric. “It’s like LEED Platinum on steroids,” Silverstein said. Love said the number one question was “what if the wood gets wet?” “It’s OK for wood to get wet. Just remove any ponding water and let it dry. It wants to breathe,” he said.
As world leaders gathered for the G7 summit last week in Kananaskis, Alberta, more than 50 wildfires burned across the province. The leaders’ joint statements included the 
Llenllenéy’ten (High Bar) First Nation (HBFN) has signed a historic Joint Development Agreement (JDA) with West Fraser Timber Co. Ltd. (West Fraser). The JDA was signed during HBFN’s National Indigenous Peoples Day event in Clinton on June 21. A press release issued by High Bar on June 24 stated that “The landmark agreement highlights HBFN’s commitment to sustainable forest management through partnership with the private sector to achieve mutually beneficial outcomes.” The relationship ensures fibre supply for West Fraser, and opens the door for more diverse fibre product development. At the same time, HBFN notes that the agreement creates a path toward increased resource revenues and decision-making authority for HBFN, which marks a meaningful step toward economic reconciliation. Under the JDA, West Fraser will transfer a portion of its timber harvesting rights to Llenllenéy’ten (High Bar) First Nation. 
With wildfire season in full swing, an immigration consultant says there is a simple way to end the shortage of qualified people to fight wildfires: Let existing, trained firefighters who are non-residents stay once their work permits expire by letting them choose a path to permanent residency. Jennie McCahill is representing Irish national Jake McGavin, a team leader with a wildfire-fighting contractor called Carmanah Wildfire, which is based in Sidney but has firefighting crews spread all over B.C. …McGavin, who turns 29 in September, is in his third season fighting wildfires in B.C. He’s been lucky to have received a pair of two-year work permits, but the second is soon to run out. …He wants to stay in Canada not only because he’s fallen in love with B.C. …”Unfortunately, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada does not recognize wildland firefighting as skilled work.”
Over 7,600 people shared their views on outdoor recreation in a first-ever public survey conducted by Mosaic. “The feedback we received tells us how important Mosaic’s managed forests are to people’s lives,” said Jimmie Hodgson at Mosaic. “It reinforces our responsibility to work toward solutions that reflect what we heard.” Early findings show:
Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish Nation) and the Province have signed an agreement to guide forest stewardship in Squamish Nation territory at a ceremony held at the top of the Sea-to-Sky gondola overlooking Átl’ḵa7tsem (Howe Sound). “This agreement will ensure our cultural sites and key environmental areas are protected for future generations. These have been our lands for thousands of years, and the fact they are now back under our direct control provides a greater sense of security for our people, and a strong optimism for our future,” said Sxwíxwtn Wilson Williams, Councillor and elected spokesperson, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish Nation). …The next step will be to complete a ministerial order, which will include consultation with First Nations, and engagement with the public. It aims to establish objectives for the forestry sector to follow in alignment with the agreement and provide the Squamish Nation certainty in sites of high value.
Firefighters are urging hikers and mountain bikers not to enter trails closed due to a wildfire just north of Squamish, B.C., ahead of the Canada Day long weekend. The Dryden Creek wildfire, which was discovered on June 9, is considered under control by the B.C. Wildfire Service, but a local state of emergency remains in Squamish and a campfire ban remains in effect for the district. Fire suppression work is ongoing in the area, and evacuation orders and alerts remain due to the danger of trees falling and rocks rolling loose. Despite that, firefighters say they’re seeing people disobey trail closures, which could prove to be a risky decision. “Especially last weekend, numerous hikers and mountain bikers accessed trails that were closed,” said B.C. Wildfire fire information officer Jennifer Lohmeyer on Tuesday. “Some people even moved barriers that had been put in place to indicate that the trail was closed,” she added.
The City of Delta is undertaking an inventory of its trees. Crews started last week in Ladner, collecting data on street and park trees as part of Delta’s Urban Forest Strategy. In its request for proposals this spring for a qualified arboricultural consultant to conduct the urban forest subsection inventory of individual city-owned urban trees, the city noted it wanted to focus on street and park specimen trees. The project does not include trees on private property, nor is it the intent to include larger stands of trees in the city’s natural areas. The purpose of the project is to expand a tree inventory that was started in-house in 2023, improve asset management, as well as gain an accurate cost of a city-wide tree inventory for areas with low, medium and high canopy coverage.
It’s been hot in southern Ontario [with] apocalyptic news coverage out of Toronto…. “The world is burning,” announces the headline of a parenting advice column in The Globe and Mail. “Should we tell our children?” The author’s children are not told about forest fires… They are not told about the huge, ongoing increase in greenhouse gas emissions in Asia, cancelling out many times over the modest reductions achieved at great cost in North America and Europe. …The answer… is that natural variability is larger than the trend line produced by statistics. It’s true that Canada has seen more communities damaged or destroyed by fire, but that’s largely because there are more communities. …The Second World War was nearing its end, but the war on forest fires was just beginning, with the deployment of heavy equipment as well as aircraft. Saving timber was the goal, and the unintended consequences have piled up ever since.
New film reveals the roots of B.C.’s wildfire crisis—and what we must do to stop it. A powerful new documentary exploring the causes and consequences of British Columbia’s escalating wildfire crisis will premiere to the public at the Vernon Performing Arts Centre Thursday June 26 at 7:00 pm. Titled B.C. is Burning, the 45-minute film delivers a sobering but hopeful look at what’s fueling today’s megafires—and the science-based solutions that could protect our forests, our communities, and our future. B.C. is Burning was independently produced and funded through community support, with Homestead Foods generously contributing half of the total budget. We also gratefully acknowledge major support from Skyline Helicopters, Padoin Reforestation, and Kalesnikoff.
For years, forest firefighters in Ontario have been calling on the provincial government to reclassify their jobs to recognize them as an emergency service in a bid to stem recruitment and retention issues. It’s a change the Ford government promised it would take on after sustained pressure from front-line staff and union officials. The province now says work to reclassify forest firefighters — officially called resource technicians — has been “completed,” and is blaming the Ontario Public Service Employees Union for a delay in announcing the move. Whether the terms the government has put forward address the substantive changes called for by forest firefighters is contested. Draft information seen by Global News shows the reclassification involves renaming positions within the existing union structure — and moving people one category further up the grid, for a raise of roughly $3 per hour.
Recent rainfall has reduced the wildfire hazard across northwestern Ontario, though the region’s largest wildfire is now more than 194,000 hectares large. Red Lake 12 — the fire that has forced community evacuations in Deer Lake First Nation and Sandy Lake First Nation — remains not under control. However, precipitation and cooler temperatures have given FireRangers more breathing room over the past few days and have also reduced smoke levels. However, thunderstorms this past weekend have created the potential for holdover fires caused by lightning, which crews will be monitoring over the next week. Red Lake 12 has 23 firefighting crews assigned to three divisions on the fire’s south and eastern perimeters, supported by 18 helicopters, including four heavy helicopters with increased bucketing capacity, Ontario Forest Fires said in its latest update.