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.
We studied the efficiency and productivity of BC’s secondary wood manufacturing sector using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and Malmquist total factor productivity index (MPI), while incorporating data from both a survey on individual firms and Statistics Canada’s sectoral data. DEA results showed that BC’s secondary wood manufacturing firms had low efficiency and the factor contributing to the inefficiency was more lack of technical capability than scale of operations in most of the business types. The MPI results reveal that SWM consistently underperforms relative to the sawmill and panel sectors, with a clear divergence emerging after the 2007–2009 financial crisis. Weak productivity growth is largely attributable to limited and inconsistent technical change, reflecting a lack of innovation and adoption of new technologies. Policies aimed at supporting the sector could focus on factors improving firms’ technical efficiency and frontier such as process optimization, technology adoption and innovation, and training and skill development.
Since its launch in 2018, the 
WASHINGTON, D.C. — U.S. Representatives Glenn Thompson (R-PA) and Andrea Salinas (D-OR) introduced the Mass Timber Federal Buildings Act. This marks the third consecutive year that legislation promoting mass timber for federal contracts has been introduced. This bipartisan legislation provides incentives for the use of mass timber building materials in federal contracting, giving timber and other forest products companies the ability to compete for construction, renovation, or acquisition of public buildings, and for military construction. The bill creates a two-tier contracting preference for mass timber and other innovative wood projects. The first-tier preference applies to mass timber that is made within the U.S. and responsibly sourced from state, federal, private, and Tribal forestlands. The optional second tier applies to mass timber products that are sourced from restoration practices, fire mitigation projects, and forest owners. Additionally, this bill contains a reporting requirement for a whole building lifecycle assessment. 
The American Forest & Paper Association (AF&PA), Washington, has released its 66th Annual Paper Industry Capacity and Fiber Consumption Survey. …The report shows that fiber consumption declined by 3.5% in 2025, with recovered fiber consumption decreasing by 4% and wood pulp consumption falling by 3.2%. The printing-writing paper operating rate improved, reaching 82.8% in 2025, while containerboard operating rates remained steady at 91.9%. Packaging paper production also increased by 1.7%, while boxboard production essentially was flat at 12.4 million tons and tissue production remained near 7.8 million tons. Despite the resilience shown by these sectors, US paper and paperboard production declined 3.7% last year, to 66.3 million tons, AF&PA says. …Containerboard production fell 4.4% to 36.1 million tons, and containerboard capacity declined 5.1% in 2025. …Printing-writing capacity fell 13.9% last year to 7.7 million tons. …Tissue production declined 0.8% in 2025 to 7.8 million tons, though, over time, it has represented a growing share of total US paper and paperboard capacity.
Wood is in most buildings you enter. But how do you know it’s safe? “The work we do at the Forest Products Laboratory is important for everybody’s everyday lives in terms of the buildings we live in, work in, and play in,” said Forest Products Laboratory materials research engineer Laura Hasburgh. Wood may be present in the structural part of the building, such as the wall or ceiling framing. Wood is also used for interior finishes, like trim, doors, furniture and cabinetry. That’s why the safety and durability of wood products are important for everyone—from the businesses making the products to the people using them. However, testing wood materials for durability and resistance to moisture, weight, and fire is largely unaffordable for industry and universities. The Forest Service’s 
U.S. Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.) encouraged the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to tackle the nation’s housing affordability crisis by helping make mass timber a more mainstream building material. Mass timber usage was one issue discussed at a Senate Transportation, Housing and Urban Development (THUD) Appropriations Subcommittee hearing chaired by Hyde-Smith to review the FY2027 HUD budget request. …Hyde-Smith sought HUD Secretary Scott Turner’s commitment to engage with the U.S. Forest Service, state forest commissions, research universities, and builders to incorporate mass timber in home construction as one means to tackle housing affordability. …”Mass timber multifamily housing is demonstrating an ability to lower construction costs and reduce the time it takes to build, which makes it an ideal approach for helping increase affordable housing production,” Hyde-Smith said. 
At a time when the nation is facing a severe housing shortage, more multistory apartment buildings would offer more homes to more people. And there’s a big added benefit: Residents would be much safer from fires. A new study by 
The city of Seattle opened its first warehouse for salvaged lumber Friday in SoDo. Seattle Mayor Katie Wilson cut a red wood “ribbon” with a chainsaw to mark the occasion. The warehouse, operated by Earthwise Architectural Salvage, will serve as a place where lumber from the demolition or renovation of buildings is collected and sold for new construction, or to make furniture and other DIY projects. “Reuse is better than recycling,” said Katie Kennedy, the Seattle Public utilities manager who helped obtain the grant for the city. “You are displacing the need for new materials.” In addition to saving trees from being cut down for new lumber, the project is aimed at reducing waste and emissions.
Mass timber is frequently praised for its aesthetic appeal and sustainability benefits. However, what often goes unrecognized are the construction phase advantages it brings to a project—advantages that directly impact schedule certainty, jobsite safety and overall delivery predictability. Beyond appearance and environmental performance, mass timber fundamentally changes how buildings are built. For owners and developers focused on speed to market and reduced risk, these operational benefits deserve just as much attention as design and carbon metrics. Mass timber construction shifts critical decision-making earlier in the project lifecycle. Structural elements such as cross-laminated timber (CLT) panels and glulam beams are fabricated off-site and arrive ready to install. There is no waiting on cure times, no extended periods of formwork or shoring, and fewer weather-related delays during structural erection.
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The Finnish Sawmill Industry Association is urging the government to accelerate wood construction and broaden the use of domestic wood in building, saying Finland is not using wood construction enough to raise value added for domestic wood, support investment and strengthen regional vitality. It calls for the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment to lead a national wood-construction program and appoint a high-level cross-government steering group, the Finnish Sawmill Industry Association reported. The association links wood construction to Finland’s competitiveness and industrial policy and says the market’s development should be treated as part of efforts to cut emissions from the built environment. It also calls for increasing the use of domestic wood more broadly in construction, beyond wood construction in a narrow sense. …It calls for regulation and permitting processes to be developed in a direction it says enables investments and links wood construction to Finland’s clean-transition investment goals. 
