Ian Dunn

Cross-border quarrels between Canada and the U.S. over goods and supply are nothing new, having its roots in the pre-Confederation days of the Jay Treaty of 1794, said Ian Dunn. The president-CEO of the 51-member Ontario Forest Industries Association (OFIA) calls the ongoing fight over exported Canadian lumber to the U.S. “probably the largest global trade dispute” since the close of the Second World War. “Tariffs are not a new thing for the lumber producers and our membership,” said Dunn. …About 97% of Ontario’s forest products exports annually – amounting to $7.7 billion of trade – heads to the U.S. in the form of lumber, pulp, newsprint and structural panels. Slap on a 25 per cent tariff and that’s close to $2 billion coming out of Ontario. …Should the combination of increased duties and Trump tariffs remain in place for an extended period of time, Ontario’s forest industry would be a shadow of its former self.