From consumer sentiment and housing starts to lumber markets and European producers, the economic fallout from the Iran conflict is increasingly showing up across the forest sector. In related news: the US added 115k jobs in April; BC lost 40k jobs year-to-date; Canadian Home Buiders expect big drops in housing starts; and Taiga reported Q1 net earnings of $9M.
In Wood Product news: a YouTube series on what it takes to turn a tree into a world class building; Freres pushes forward with new mass timber projects; and a Brazil tree may fight COVID-19. In Forestry news: FPAC welcomes Canada’s move to address transportation supply chain challenges; Ontario invests $5M to support forest-based biofuels; Washington state confronts cash crunch due to logging deferrals; and UK’s falling tree nursery production suggests confidence woes.
Finally, today marks the start of International Pulp Week in Vancouver—two days of market intelligence, informed dialogue, and strategic connections across the global pulp supply chain. Keep your eye on the Frog for conference coverage throughout the week.
Kelly McCloskey, Tree Frog News Editor
Forest Products Association of Canada (FPAC) welcomes the Government of Canada’s announcement today on addressing long‑standing, structural challenges across the country’s transportation supply chains. Reliable, efficient, and cost‑effective transportation networks are essential to the forest sector’s ability to support domestic manufacturing, reach global markets, and sustain jobs in hundreds of rural and Indigenous communities across Canada. “Canada’s transportation system continues to face three fundamental challenges—cost pressures driven by limited competition, infrastructure bottlenecks across key trade corridors, and ongoing labour instability,” said Derek Nighbor, FPAC President and CEO. “Addressing these issues together is essential to reducing costs for shippers, improving system reliability, and supporting long‑term economic growth and jobs across hundreds of forest-dependent communities.” Currently, the forest sector must absorb billions of dollars in freight costs annually, the vast majority of these accruing from rail transportation – representing more than 15% of the sector’s annual GDP contribution and up to 25% of a shipper’s delivered product costs.
Statistics Canada says B.C. lost more than 40,000 jobs over the first four months of the year, and more than 11,000 full-time positions last month alone. Premier David Eby says this comes as little surprise, and the explanation is obvious, with a major pillar of the province’s economy continuing to take a beating from a major trade war with the U.S. “Our softwood lumber sector is under huge pressure,” he said. “The tariffs we face are higher than those faced by Russia and Europe when they import wood to the United States. And as a result, Russia and Europe are exporting more wood to the United States than they ever have.” As well, exports from B.C. to the U.S. are down, which is affecting all provinces, Eby says.
Alberta Forest Week is just behind us – one of those natural moments throughout the year where I take time to pause and reflect on the challenges behind us, the opportunities that lie ahead, and all of the people who make that work possible. This year, I find myself thinking about what it truly means to be part of a forest community. Because at its core, this sector isn’t just about trees — it’s about people. The ones who show up early, stay late, and take pride in work that often goes unseen. The ones who build their lives around the forests, who care deeply about the land, and who understand that what they do today matters for generations to come. …So however you choose to celebrate Alberta Forest Week — whether it’s a walk in the woods, taking a closer look at the products we rely on every day, or simply learning something new — please take a moment to recognize the people behind it all.
The American Forest Resource Council warns that Washington’s Department of Natural Resources is headed for deep budget trouble that will result in state worker layoffs and force taxpayers to foot more of the bill to keep the agency running. Counties that rely on logging revenue from land the agency manages could be at financial risk, too. While it’s become common for the group to clash with the department, they’re not the only ones complaining. Foresters inside the agency are pointing to Public Lands Commissioner Dave Upthegrove’s decision to pause some timber sales for eight months as a reason for the looming deficit in a key operating account, which covers many of the department’s expenses for managing timberland. …Upthegrove and other agency leadership say … it has less to do with recent timber sale activity on state land and more to do with the timing of when logging revenue reaches the agency. 
For the last few decades, the working assumption in European fire management was geographic: the real threat lives at lower elevations. In countries like Greece, Portugal, and Spain, the threat was tied to parched lowlands, flammable scrub, and summer drought. The Alps, Pyrenees, and Carpathians sat above the areas at risk, written off as too cold and wet to carry serious fires. A 25-year satellite record now challenges that assumption. Tracking fires across eight European mountain ranges, researchers found flames climbing the slopes at a steady rate — and the pace has picked up sharply since 2015. A team led by Dr. Mirela Beloiu, an ecologist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH Zurich), tracked wildfires across eight European mountain regions from 2000 to 2025. The pattern was hard to miss. Fires are climbing the slopes at roughly 236 feet per decade, finding fuel in stands that almost never burned before.
UK — The significant decline in the number of trees produced by Britain’s nurseries provides a “stark illustration” of the sector’s ‘falling’ confidence, an industry leader has said. Around 139 million trees were grown in the UK’s private and public nurseries across 2025/26, a sharp fall on previous years. In both 2024/25 and 2023/24, nurseries grew slightly over 160 million trees, with 2022/23 totalling slightly under 152 million. This means the total number of trees produced fell by around 14% between 2024/25 and 2025/26. …The findings were contained with the Forestry Commission’s new Tree Supply report – published in late April – which pointed to reduced planting expectations in Scotland as being a major cause of the decline. Stuart Goodall, chief executive at industry body Confor, said: “the report provides a stark illustration of the concerns that have been raised for a number of years – government targets for tree planting are not being met and this is affecting confidence and business activity in the sector.
THUNDER BAY — The Ontario government is investing $5.5 million to help Greenwater Technology produce renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel using mill by-products and underused wood. This investment will support new opportunities for made-in-Ontario forest products, create new revenue streams to drive growth in forestry and empower the aviation and transportation industries to adopt sustainable fuels. As part of the government’s plan to protect Ontario, the government is making strategic investments to help forest sector businesses adapt, compete and grow to stay resilient in the face of U.S. tariffs. …After bringing the technology to market, Greenwater plans to integrate biofuel plants at anchor mills, providing an on-site use for forest biomass that would increase productivity, strengthen forestry supply chains and generate new revenue streams.
