The Trump administration is expected to formally declare on Wednesday that it will not extend the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement on trade, starting a decade-long clock to wind down the 32-year-old North American free trade zone. That declaration will kick off a six-year review session, part of a “sunset clause” negotiated by President Trump’s first administration. However, it will do little to alter contentious negotiations over the pact’s future, including sweeping demands to boost US content in automotive production and trade protections to block Chinese goods. …Trade chiefs from the US, Mexico and Canada are expected to meet virtually on Wednesday and declare whether they want to extend the pact for another 16 years. …Failure to reach agreement on revisions to USMCA would keep the trade pact in an indefinite limbo, with similar review sessions annually for the next 10 years. …The review and sunset process is separate from a termination clause that the US could exercise, triggering a withdrawal within six months.
Related coverage by:
- Kelly Malone, Canadian Press: Trade pact set to stay in place as US blows past key deadline
- Daniel Desrochers in Politico: Trump ‘hates’ his own trade deal. But he’ll have a hard time killing it
- Shawn Jeffords in CBC News: Businesses and unions are balancing anxiety and hope for CUSMA
The European Union has formally removed its remaining tariffs on American wood-based industrial products after the European Parliament approved legislation implementing the long-awaited 
China remains one of the world’s major importers of softwood logs and lumber, but its 
Japan’s housing starts surged 33.9% yoy in May 2026, sharply accelerating from a 11.4% increase in the previous month and marking the second straight month of expansion. It was also the fastest growth since March 2025, topping market expectations of 31.8%. Growth was broad-based across most segments, including owner-occupied homes (31.8% vs 19.5% in April), rental housing (33.3% vs 17.3%), built-for-sale housing (39.2% vs 3.4%), and two-by-four homes (24.8% vs 64.8%). In contrast, prefabricated housing fell 3.4%, swinging from a 11.1% increase in April.
Russia’s timber exports to China, its largest overseas market, fell sharply in the first four months of 2026 as Beijing’s prolonged property downturn weighed on demand, adding to mounting pressure on an industry already struggling with sanctions, high borrowing costs and weak profitability. Exports of Russian sawn timber to China dropped 30% year on year to 2.6 million cubic meters in January-April, while export revenue declined 26% to $603.7 million, the Vedomosti business daily reported. …China accounted for roughly half of Russia’s sawn timber exports in 2025 after Europe closed its market following Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. But weakening Chinese construction activity, rising logistics costs and a stronger ruble have eroded demand, leaving Russian producers with fewer alternative markets. Russia’s total sawn timber exports fell 32% year-on-year to around 4 million cubic meters in the January-April period. China imported 11.2 million cubic meters of Russian sawn timber in 2025.
Join us for the 16th edition of this flagship event—the only conference of its kind this year offering such a comprehensive view of the Cellulose market, covering the entire value chain from upstream to downstream. CelCo started up the conference Investing in Cellulose in 2011. Since then, it has been running every year in London, in November, the first Monday of the London Pulp Week. Its objective is to gather the entire cellulose value chain: from specialty wood pulp and cotton linters pulp suppliers to all viscose, acetate, ether & MCC, nitrate, cellophane, tyrecord, sausage casings, and sponge applications, as well as final converters up to “Brand levels” (textile, hygiene, pharmaceutical, cigarette, automotive, food, construction industries, etc.). The one-day conference includes a full-day event with 8 speakers, a breakfast, formal lunch, coffee breaks, and a cocktail the previous evening. The event will be held on Monday, November 9, 2026, from 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. at the luxurious Waldorf Hotel near Covent Garden. …This event is organized by CelCo, a cellulose consulting company registered in Switzerland, led by Christian Chavassieu, and assisted by its partner, Numera Analytics.
A proposed change to England’s fire-safety guidance could make it much harder to use timber in load-bearing structures above 11 metres. The consultation on changes to Approved Document B, the fire-safety guidance used under the Building Regulations in England, closes on 1 July 2026. Under the draft text, load-bearing elements of structure in buildings with a storey more than 11 metres above ground level should be made from materials or products achieving at least class A2-s3,d2. Most structural timber and mass timber products do not normally meet this reaction-to-fire classification. The proposal would move the debate beyond external walls and cladding. It could affect the structural frame itself in a much wider group of mid-rise residential, commercial and mixed-use buildings. This matters because mass timber and CLT are increasingly used in projects where developers want faster construction and lower embodied carbon compared with concrete or steel.
SINGAPORE — The Alliance to End Plastic Waste today published 
As the Victorian Forestry Transition Program comes to a close, some residents in regions that relied on the timber trade are questioning what has been done to build a replacement economy. The state government’s transition program ends today, two-and-a-half years after Victoria’s native logging industry was brought to an end with the flourish of a pen. The government committed $1.5 billion to support the transition, including $320 million to the Forestry Transition Program to provide financial support for affected workers, businesses and communities. But some residents remain unconvinced enough has been done to replace the jobs lost. …A Victorian auditor general’s 
Nordic, Baltic and Austrian forest industry associations are calling for a realistic and enabling EU climate target for the land-use sector, warning that overly high expectations for forest carbon sinks could place unnecessary pressure on forestry and the bioeconomy. In a joint letter dated 24 June 2026, several European forest industry associations said the EU’s post-2030 climate framework should focus primarily on phasing out fossil emissions, while allowing the land-use sector to continue providing renewable raw materials and climate solutions. The associations argue that forests and the wider land-use sector provide sustainable biomass that can replace fossil-based or carbon-intensive products, materials and energy. They say this role is important for Europe’s transition towards a circular and climate-neutral bioeconomy.
LONDON — The world’s rainforests are to be better protected from deforestation as the government will confirm during London Climate Action Week, that plans to take forward new rules in Great Britain including using powers in the Environment Act alongside legislation strengthening the UK Timber Regulation. Under the proposals UK businesses who trade in commodities sourced from rainforests… will need to check that their supply chains are not contributing to illegal deforestation. …UK companies have been at the forefront of global efforts to tackle deforestation within their supply chains, but voluntary action alone cannot tackle this global challenge, and several major supermarkets have been calling for stronger regulation. Rainforests and other forests are vital for storing carbon and sustaining biodiversity, yet they are increasingly threatened by deforestation. … Rules will be enforced using powers in the Environment Act, alongside legislation strengthening existing timber rules.
AUSTRALIA — Tasmania’s public native forestry company has corrected the record in a parliamentary committee after earlier stating that all logs from public native forests were processed in Tasmania. Tasmanian sawmill operator James Neville-Smith confirmed that some logs had been sent to Victoria, where processors had received compensation from the Victorian government as part of its industry shutdown. Mr Neville-Smith said the decision was due to retooling a sawmill to be plantation-only, meaning that hardwood logs needed to be processed elsewhere. Logs displaying stickers from Tasmanian state forests were also spotted at a mill in Powelltown, in the Yarra Valley, that was also a recipient of millions in Victorian compensation payments. Victoria phased out native forest logging in 2024. Since then, environmental groups have raised concerns about large quantities of logs being transported to Victoria on the Spirit of Tasmania, but were told that all were from private forests.
JAKARTA — Pulp and paper giant APRIL’s recent decision to lower its deforestation commitments and source wood from two companies associated with extensive recent forest loss has created a new challenge for its relationship with the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), with environmental groups urging the world’s leading forestry certifier to terminate the already suspended reassociation process. In late May, APRIL announced it was reviewing its decade-old Sustainable Forest Management Policy 2.0 and lowering its deforestation cutoff date from 2015 to Dec. 31, 2020. The move allows the pulp and paper producer to source wood from PT Industrial Forest Plantation and PT Mayawana Persada, two companies that have experienced some of the country’s largest recent forest losses. APRIL said the decision was necessary to address fibre shortages after the Indonesian government revoked the operating permits of four of its long-term suppliers earlier this year, affecting around 15% of its wood supply in Riau Province.
During the 1930s, Italy’s government launched a sweeping reforestation effort in the Prealps region near Lake Como, planting fast-growing Norway spruce on land that had been pasture and meadow for centuries. It was a conscious decision, made mainly to answer the demand for timber, but it did not involve much ecological thinking. Now, 90 years later, a new study has gone back to measure what that decision actually did to the landscape, and the results are not flattering. According to the study, ‘
OFUNATO, Iwate — An industry organization aimed at promoting the use of fire-damaged timber has been launched in this northeastern Japan city, in response to a forest fire that broke out here in February 2025 burning approximately 3,370 hectares. The organization, named “TEAM Shinrin Saisei Ofunato” … aims to address challenges surrounding the harvesting of damaged trees and expand distribution channels for related wood products. Trees can still be utilized for parts that were not burned or if the damage was limited to the bark, but they must be cut down promptly before moisture loss makes them difficult to use. By strengthening cooperation among the logging, lumber processing, and construction sectors, which are currently divided into separate segments of the wood industry, the organization hopes to make better use of the damaged timber and encourage forest owners to proceed with logging and reforestation.
UK — The City watchdog has closed an investigation into the owner of the Drax power plant after an almost 10-month review into whether the company’s sustainability claims mislead shareholders. The Financial Conduct Authority said it had “reviewed thousands of pages” of “complex material” relating to the company’s sourcing of wood pellets for the Drax power plant in Selby, North Yorkshire, but “did not find evidence that justified any further action”. The regulator began the investigation last year into whether Drax’s annual reports and accounts between 2021 and 2023 misled shareholders or left out important information investors needed to know about the origins of its biomass fuel. …Ofgem found at the time that there was no evidence to suggest the breach was deliberate, and said instead that it was “technical in nature”. It also found no evidence that the biomass sourced was unsustainable or that Drax had wrongly laid claim to renewable energy subsidies.
LONDON — The United States accounted for about a third of the rise in global carbon emissions in 2025, as higher gas prices pushed power producers back to coal, an Energy Institute report showed. Highlights from the report include:
Western Europe is enduring a ferocious heatwave forecast to break temperature records, with half of France on red alert, rail services in Belgium disrupted and sports events in Spain and Germany cancelled or postponed. French authorities on Monday placed 49 of the country’s 96 mainland departments on a level 1 danger-to-life warning, urging 35 million people to exercise “absolute vigilance”, drink water often, avoid all strenuous exertion and stay out of direct sun. Another 40 departments were on a level 2 orange alert. “Very high temperatures are setting in for the long term across the country,” said the national meteorological service, Météo-France. “Day and night-time temperatures will be exceptional.” It said temperatures throughout western and central France were likely to exceed 40C from Monday afternoon, hitting 43C in Bordeaux, 41C in Limoges, 40C in Toulouse and Tours and 39C in Paris, and would continue rising until the end of the week.